Should Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot
by Leia1912
Summary: Sequel to "Mistletoe." So you are set up by friends to run into the man of your dreams at a Christmas party, you kiss him like nobody's business, and then you remember, oh, whoops, he just happens to be your old enemy. What's Sarah to do?
1. Prologue

Two quick notes:

The characters of _Labyrinth_ belong to Jim Henson, as you probably already know if you like reading _Labyrinth_ fan fiction.

This story is presented with thanks to my beta readers (illaona, pixxistixx4me, and the very talented Ashira) and all those who left such supportive reviews for "Mistletoe," to which this story is the sequel. 

* * *

Hoggle glanced anxiously at the crystal the Queen put on the shelf behind her, out of his line of view. "So what happens now, m'lady?" He hesitated to express the worry building in his system each second Sarah was out of his sight. The rat Jareth was the Queen's son and telling His Highness' mother that he feared for Sarah's safety at Jareth's hands would likely not go over well.

She glanced over at him and smiled indulgently. "We wait, Hoggle. They do not need our supervision now." 

"But Jareth—"

Mildly irritated, she interrupted him. "_Adores_ her, Hoggle, as I've said before. There is no way this can go awry, I assure you. He's sulked and brooded over that girl for a dozen years now, and now that we've given him the opportunity, I'm sure he will be putting an end to this silliness. You saw how quick he was to go after her when she left the ball. He may be proud, but my son is also quite determined to have his own way." 

"He didn't get his way when she beat the Labyrinth," Hoggle couldn't help pointing out.

The Queen shot him a warning look. "He _let_ her win, Hoggle. You know as well as I do what he _could_ have done to change the outcome of that little adventure." She smiled with sudden optimism. "But Sarah was just a child then and she did not understand what was being offered to her." Hoggle grunted doubtfully and she frowned at him again. "This was meant to be, as we both know. You've watched her all these years; you know she has not forgotten him." Hoggle stared at the floor, nodding slowly. He had guessed, from passing comments of Sarah's over the years, that she was secretly a bit sweet on the Goblin King. She'd never said as much directly to Hoggle on the subject, but he figured she hadn't even known it herself. Beyond that, Hoggle hadn't thought much more about her interest in Jareth, since most womenfolk reacted pretty much the same to the Goblin King (though why, Hoggle couldn't fathom). But despite his misgivings about the High Prince, when Hoggle had confided his suspicions to the Queen, she had reacted with such joy that he'd fallen under the spell of her enthusiasm and together they had set up this matchmaking plot. Now, knowing Jareth had gone storming after the girl and nothing else, Hoggle worried desperately about whether he'd been right to mention Sarah's fancy for the Goblin King at all. 

"Don't worry, Hoggle my dear!" The Queen hugged his shoulders lightly. "Why, I'm sure they will both return here, perfectly delighted with what we have done for them," she finished serenely. "What a lovely Christmas gift for all of us!"

"If he doesn't screw it all up," Hoggle muttered darkly, eyeing the shelf above the Queen's head yet again. 

* * * 

_This is not happening_. 

Sarah walked to her kitchen, carefully glancing at every shadowy corner for certain Goblin Kings, her mind racing. It was nearly midnight, she had just awakened in her normal bed, clad in quite normal pajamas of a normal T-shirt and normal shorts, with a very abnormal holly bracelet around her wrist—a holly bracelet that brought her to the horrifying conclusion that her dream of being at an Underground Christmas ball, sharing the kiss of her life with the object of her fantasies and nightmares both, was real.

She tried not to think about that solitary glass slipper she'd found on her bedroom floor. And failed miserably.

"I'm going crazy, that has to be it," she muttered to herself, pouring herself a glass of water. "I'm just going to have a drink, calm down, go back to bed, and when I wake up, I'll call a shrink."

_Or kill Hoggle_, her mind added silently.

Still flustered, she snatched up her glass and headed into the living room. Her hand paused en route to a nearby lamp; she did not need a light, as there were candles already glowing around the room.

Candles. She blinked. Even the Christmas tree was aglow. _Oh, shit_. She felt his gaze like a caress, and turned, scarcely breathing, towards the fireplace. He leaned against it as she'd expected, his smile deliciously wicked. "Good evening, Sarah."

She dropped the glass.

* * *


	2. The Return of Prince Charming

Jareth's eyebrow arched and he pushed away from the mantel, approaching her. Sarah jumped, her hands lifting as if she could physically ward him off. He paused and smirked. "I _was_ going to do you the favor of tending to your little mishap there, but if you'd rather cut your feet by stepping on broken glass, do go on."

"Oh." _Brilliant comeback, Williams. Just brilliant_. "Umm, uh, sure, take care of it." 

"As my lady wills," he responded, and before she knew it, Sarah was being lifted up, her body singed and tingling from the feel of his hands beneath her knees and at her side. Worse, as his hand curved around her upper ribcage, she was horribly aware of the fact she lacked a bra beneath her T-shirt and he was just a few finger spaces away from discovering that fact. 

Blushing furiously in the semi-darkness, she struggled against him. "What the hell are you doing? Put me down! I thought you were going to use magic to clean it up!" she exclaimed.

He laughed softly. "I did. But it was much more fun to take you out of harm's way first, I admit." And with that, he set her gently on her feet, closer to the fireplace. Beneath a new addition to the living room, a branch of mistletoe hanging from the ceiling, she noted. 

As she stood there, glaring at him, her arms crossed defensively over her chest, she tried not to tremble. Or think too much about the fact he'd decorated her living room with that damned mistletoe. "Just what do you want?"

"I came with a peace offering. Perhaps one of your Christmas presents." He smirked at her obvious suspicion and glanced down; Sarah's eyes were drawn to the glass slipper dangling from his fingertip. "I do believe you left this when you so unfortunately…were called away?"

At the present moment in time, there was no bribe that could have compelled Sarah to approach Jareth, but as he was apparently waiting on her to take the shoe back, she stepped forward quickly and snatched the shoe. Again, Sarah moved back quickly—or tried to, because like a hunter's trap closing on a fox, Jareth's hands snapped around her lower back and brought her back to him. For the second time that night, Sarah found herself in the arms of the Goblin King. His eyes had been darkly mischievous before, as he'd bent to kiss her beneath the mistletoe at his mother's ball; now as she drowned in them, now those eyes were as fierce and hungry as when he'd attempted to distract her from defeating the Labyrinth. He'd even gone so far as to falsely profess his love for her, she remembered with a shiver.

His arms tightened about her in response, reminding her of where she was in the present. She had managed to lift her arms, using her forearms to keep some space between them, her palms gripping the silk of his shirt. Continuing to look into his eyes was impossible; so too was looking at his chest, letting herself sense too much the heat and strength of the body against hers. So she settled for closing her eyes as she found herself asking, half pleading, "Jareth, what do you want?"

"Sarah, look at me." Unwillingly, she raised her eyes to his. "I want to know what happened tonight."

"I left because—" she began, but he interrupted her, a gloved finger instantly at her lips.

"Sarah, you know that is not what I meant."

Now she really could not look at him and she squirmed until his hands dropped from her waist, allowing her to back away from him. Sarah glanced around the room—anywhere but him! Anywhere but that man, haloed in gold thanks to the candlelight, as out of place in her staid apartment as a unicorn. _Or a tiger_, she thought, noting the way the points of his teeth were revealed when his mouth turned in a predatory smile. _Think, Williams. Give him a reason to go away instead of gawking at him or provoking him. _She glanced away, ran a hand through her tangled hair, and weakly feigned a casual attitude. "Look, it's the holidays, it was a holiday party, people here usually end up having too much to drink, kissing someone and waking up the next morning regretting it—Hell, most people wake up regretting more than kissing…It's practically a tradition here…"

"Regretting more than a kiss? What else, pray tell? My dear, dear Sarah, you've cheated me out of part of this enchanting mortal tradition, it seems." Jareth clicked his tongue reproachfully, while his eyes glittered mysteriously at her. They were now filled with humor, making it evident he knew she was lying. He flashed a knee-weakening smile at her. "You will have to make up for this, you know."

"I do not have to do anything, thankyouverymuch," she hissed. 

He continued on, smoothly, with the same obnoxious grin on his face: "But since you had not been indulging—in alcohol, that is—"--the side of his mouth turned up more, taunting her, mocking her with awareness of how much pleasure she'd taken in that kiss; if he winked, she _would_ slap him, she vowed—"your little explanation somehow fails to convince me, Sarah my darling." He walked around her, the smile evaporating. Now there were only searching eyes that burned through her clothing, caressed her, reduced her to trembling again. "What I know, and you know, is something rather extraordinary happened tonight, and I for one do not intend on forgetting that." He paused in his circles and his hand gently but firmly guided her face to look into his. "Can you deny it?"

"Forget it, okay? It was just a momentary thing, it wasn't real," Sarah began desperately, twisting away, but her words were cut off as Jareth hauled her forward and met her mouth with his own again.

* * *


	3. Wish Fulfillment

_Well, what do you know, lightning does strike twice_, a small voice in Sarah's non-functioning mind noted dimly above the uproar in her body, just before her rational self gave way completely to the summons of his mouth.

There was no time, no world, not even a self as she felt her mouth open for his, her eyes sliding closed as though in the Escher room once more, once more struggling to accept the limitlessness of pure fantasy, pure desire. His arms crushed her more urgently against him, as if to keep her from falling once more. But Sarah was far from secure. A rush of some enormous feeling seemed to shove her against him, seemed to make it direly necessary for her to slide her hands into his hair, to drag them down the hard muscles of his shoulders and back as if needing to assure her hands of his reality. Mere proximity was not close enough; skin was too far, really, and everywhere, her skin, calling to his through the clothing between them, burned in protest at this intolerable separation. Her hips, guided by his caressing hands but drawn forward of their own accord, were locked to his, as though the strongest magnets in the universe were located in each other's center, binding them together more surely than any magic spell might have. The world had been turned upside down; the necessity of life was not food, or water, but Jareth, only Jareth. Even air was overrated, next to the coursing rightness of his tongue stroking hers. Oxygen was to be caught in thoughtless snatches between adjustments of the lips; it was far more urgent, for reasons her body knew if her brain did not, to return the fierce press of his lips against hers, to move her mouth against his as though seeking to draw some vital element from his warm body to her own, as if the only breathable air was to be drawn from his lungs, not the forgotten, unbearable cold space about them. Her gasp of air as his mouth slipped softly from her was nearly a sob, an instinctive soft, shuddering cry as cold, lonely air took the space his heated lips once had. 

When Sarah breathed again, when she dared to drag her gaze up beyond her eyelashes, all she saw was Jareth. His lips were turned into a smug smile and he was gazing at her from but inches away. His body heat still enveloped her, wrapping her in his heady, masculine scent. Once again, she noted dimly, his arms were around her. 

Her brain returned in time to register two thoughts:

1.) That man had the uncanny ability to do with his lips what some men could not with whole lifetimes in the bedroom;

2.) And if she did not get her idiot body out of his grasp soon, said idiot body would cooperate quite happily in bringing itself into his more intimate embrace. 

"Stop doing that!" she managed to squeak out. She stared at the highest button of his shirt, ignoring the welcoming lines of muscle visible above it, desperately willing her traitorous body to distance itself from his.

His laughter tingled against her skin. "Doing what, pray tell?" 

"Making me feel—making me feel—" she stammered. Somehow, saying aloud that his kiss activated the feelings of every erotic dream she'd ever had did not seem as though it would succeed in discouraging him. 

"Feeling what, may I ask?" Dear God, did she just see a dimple? Oh, this was so unfair. 

"You know, doing that," Sarah muttered. Perhaps for once being flustered around gorgeous males would work to her advantage and drive the Goblin King away.

No such luck. Her eyes closed as he leaned forward again, but they snapped open with surprise as his mouth drifted over her ear. His intimate whisper summoned up some rebellious streak within her lower body, which defied her mind's command and brought her hips once more dangerously close to his. "Sweet Sarah, do you think I would be here now if you were not perhaps 'doing it' as well? Do you know what torture you are for a man, Sarah?" God, he was nuzzling her neck now and from the contact of their bodies, it was quite apparent just how "tortured" he was. 

Sarah bit her tongue before it did anything regrettable, like entangling itself again with Jareth's, and forced herself not to respond. "Stop it right now." She wished her voice would sound as if she meant it. "Look, I don't know what sort of person you think I am, but I don't hop into bed with a man just because we kissed. Not everyone takes sex as lightly as you apparently do." She tried frantically to think of a definite reason that would send him running. "In fact, I've vowed to wait until marriage."

She would have been proud of herself for inventing this line, but for the fact Jareth appeared utterly unfazed. He pulled back an inch to look her in the eye and shrugged lightly. "Fine. Marry me." Her jaw fell open and he smirked. "Problem solved. Now, to an early wedding night…?"

She was too shocked by his—his—_proposal_, her brain fumbled—to even struggle as he pulled her against him once more. "What did you just say?"

He nipped at her ear. "Marry me. The position of my queen happens to be open, you allegedly desire to save yourself for marriage" (she felt him shrug with disbelief) "so why should I not indulge…your every desire?"

Although Sarah did not consider herself a sexist, from her personal experience, normal single men did not typically offer marriage quite so easily. If even at all, she added to herself, remembering her last boyfriend to bolt when the question of a shared future had been raised. And while one could hardly call the Goblin King a normal man, Sarah had a strong sense he did not differ from mortal men in this regard. She studied Jareth's features suspiciously; he returned her gaze with an annoyingly innocent expression. _There's a reason for this, there is no way in any world he's serious…He has to have figured out a way to get around a marriage vow, if he's so careless about a proposal... _Suddenly, her head jerked up and she attempted to step away, although his arms held her still. "Whoa, there, Mr. I-Can-Reorder-Time! I know what your game is. You mean to seduce me and then turn back time to forget the whole thing! And who said I even liked you, let alone wanted to sleep with you, anyway?"

He laughed out loud. "Darling, I've already said you are _quite_ unforgettable. Twelve years of being unforgettable, in fact," and he tapped her nose lightly while her mouth opened in surprise. "And as for attraction, my dear, those are not my own hands on my…" and he let his voice trail off as his eyes, sparkling wickedly, glanced over his shoulder.

She gasped in horror and jerked her hands off his rear. _My God, I was feeling up the Goblin King's ass._ Half of her wanted to die; the other half wanted to cheer and luxuriate in the memories. _And what an ass it is_. Sarah clenched her hands before they could do any more trouble. She brought her rebellious palms up against his chest, trying to push away. He looked down at her merrily, forcing her to make eye contact with him.

"Not that I object at all," he murmured, smirking. 

Too humiliated to think up a witty comeback, Sarah leaned her head against his chest to avoid those wicked, wonderful eyes. Or the lips brushing against her temple, making her whimper involuntarily. Or the words, slipping into her ear despite her efforts to block them out. Phrases managed to pierce her consciousness. "Do not fear your desire, my sweet…Just trust me, and I shall be guided by your every wish…Every pleasure shall be yours…Trust me, and I swear it, I will not rest until you have tasted paradise this night…" Her brain fought for her virtue as her body begged to succumb._ Think, Williams. _Her eyes narrowed as her ears suddenly recognized what she was hearing beyond Jareth's alluring heartbeat._ Why is there a Barry White song playing on the stereo? I didn't turn on the stereo! _"I did, and the song choice is coming from _your_ thoughts, love," she heard him murmur into her ear. She realized then that the Goblin King had led one of her hands to his shoulder and was now rocking her gently in his arms. _Are we actually slow dancing?_

She scowled suspiciously and lifted her head. The cat that ate the proverbial canary did not have a more satisfied smile than that on Jareth's face. _All because of a kiss, a kiss that should never have happened, damn mistletoe—damn Hoggle, I shouldn't have gone to the party—wait a second, why was Jareth even there to begin with? _"Hoggle told me you weren't even going to be at your mother's party—what happened?"

His brow furrowed. "Of course I was to be there, I've no idea why he would tell you I wouldn't…" He gazed into the distance, then his eyes narrowed suddenly. His jaw tightened subtly, and he shook his head. His eyes returned to her then, relaxing, a soft smile tugging up the corner of his mouth. Sarah battled the instinct to trace that curve with her tongue. "Very well done, my dear, you almost distracted me."

"I think you are trying to distract _me_," she retorted. There was something in his face, a slight tension in the otherwise relaxed and victorious expression, that told her he was hiding something. "Why were you at your mother's party, Jareth?" Another thought hit her through the maddening feelings his proximity provoked. "Why was I invited?"

He sighed impatiently. "Sarah, I knew nothing about your invitation. I was just as surprised as you were, although most pleasantly so, I assure you." He grinned; her knees melted obediently.

She clung to her reason heroically. "But why did your mother let Hoggle invite me? He obviously lied to me about you coming for a reason." She gasped. "Why? There was a plan behind all this, wasn't there? Hoggle was being used again, just like when he gave me the peach. Was it you this time? Your mother? You're after revenge, that's it, right?"

He stopped abruptly. The hands touching her lightly tightened their grip as his expression darkened. "My revenge is not something you would mistake, Sarah. I suggest you do not leap to conclusions," he said icily. She paled—how could she have forgotten how dangerous he was when angered? _Points to you yet again, Williams. _He seemed to note her fear--his face softened and he leaned closer to her, his golden hair brushing her face. In a low, lovely voice--that damnable, darkly masculine voice that suggested all the pleasures possible in one night--he murmured, "There is no need for us to quarrel… I do believe we are alone, with the night still before us, and I for one would rather not spend this moment discussing anyone else when much more pleasurable topics are at hand…"

She felt one of his hands moving through her hair while the other gently stroked her side, teasing strokes that hinted at what his touch would really be like. 

_Think, Williams. Think. So, you run into him at the party and he's not exactly thrilled to see you. Then again, I suppose I wouldn't be too happy to meet someone cussing me out, either. And then he turns on the charm, just to torment you and drive you insane. The man is the world's best flirt, no doubt about that. And now he's chased you home and he's apparently hell-bent on getting some, and why shouldn't he think he wouldn't, given the way I fall all over him every chance I get._ The hand he had lifted to his shoulder, she suddenly realized, had worked its way around his neck to toy with his hair and even horrified as she was at her involuntary actions, Sarah could not bring herself to draw her fingers away.She watched them toy with the candlelit gold of his hair and caught his triumphant eye. _Damn!_ She sighed. _But let's not forget, Williams, he apparently thinks you'll just let him dance you to the bedroom right now—hell, the nearest horizontal surface. He's being a mocking ass, making jokes about marriage just to score. Great. Not only have I managed to engage in physical warfare with a walking fantasy, but he's a commitmentphobe, like just about every other guy I've known. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am, this time with some glitter, but that's all the difference otherwise. That, and he'd probably be fantas—Stop it, Williams! Don't let yourself be used! Have a little pride!_

Using all the strength in her body, summoning up all the stored anger against every ex-boyfriend she'd ever had, Sarah broke away and sat down in a chair, scowling at him. 

He watched her with a bemused expression, crossing his arms slowly over his chest with the slow grace of a panther stretching. Still but alert, he stood there, gazing at her. 

He didn't seem to be in the mood to say anything, so she broke the silence first. Well, the silence between them. Now her CD player from hell was helpfully supplying them with an Al Green song. _First thing tomorrow, that's going in the trash. _"Look, I think I've made it clear, this isn't going any further. I don't know you and I don't know what you are about, other than to sleep with me, and that's not going to happen." She dug her nails into the chair as her body instinctively went warm with the thought. Then she froze as the CD player switched songs. For a horribly long moment the room was silent but for an infamous DeVinyls song. There was no looking at him with _that_ on the stereo. Sarah blushed to the roots of her hair and kept her eyes averted. 

Mercifully—if one could call it that—the Satanic CD player switched to "Wild is the Wind." She swallowed finally and hazarded a glance at Jareth. He at least appeared serious now, his mouth a set line, eyes trained upon her. Noting her gaze, he raised an eyebrow coolly and cocked his head. "No, you don't know me, Sarah, or what I want."

"Well, what _do_ you want?" she blurted out before she could stop herself.

"I want," he began and strode forward. She dug her fingernails further into the chair, knowing an escape attempt would only provide him with the opportunity to capture her in his arms again. _Those arms…_She was knocked out of her reverie as Jareth knelt by the chair and suddenly, the glass slipper was in his hand again. She stared at him as he slipped it on her foot, a whimsical smile on his face. Then he glanced at her, shrugged lightly, and she felt the slipper disappear. "You…to come back with me. I want…" His light smile vanished as his eyes devoured hers, searching her face intently. "To know how you fit in this story. I want…to explore…_this_," he murmured, and his gloved finger slid over her cheek before she could bring herself to move away.

Sarah stared at him, hysteria bubbling up in her throat. She tried not to listen to the awful urge within her that wanted to burst out either laughing or sobbing. _Oh, dear God. I've stumbled into an Underground version of "The Bachelor," and next thing you know, he'll start talking about going on "a journey" with me and wanting to find out where "the journey" ends. Or maybe I won't be the girl he picks; maybe I won't get a rose and I'll be the next person booted in the rose ceremony._ Even in her semi-hysteria, something dark clawed at her inside as she imagined Bachelor-Jareth rejecting her for another woman. _Great, now I know I'd be the rejectee who throws jealous tantrums and is the butt of everybody's jokes online the next day. _That did it: she giggled. 

"Mmmm?" Jareth inquired indulgently, his eyes amused. Sarah's humor left her abruptly as she had the distinct feeling he knew just what she'd been thinking. While he might not be a devotee of reality television, or television at all, she had no doubt he could understand the gist of her thoughts. Her eyes narrowed.

"Jareth, you want to explore my body, not 'this,' which doesn't exist. And no, that is not an invitation."

"Tsk-tsk, Sarah. Where did you learn that it is not possible to be both…intrigued…by a person and desire her, as well?" He leaned in, his voice dropping conspiratorially as he drew his fingertip slowly up her thigh. "And I do assure you, as you seem quite worried about it, your body is on my to-do list and will receive my most complete and thorough attention, as it pleases you."

"That's it!" She put her hands on his shoulders---_nice, well-muscled, arrgh!—_and pushed him back. "You don't know me, I don't know you, and I am _certainly_ not going to drop my life just to be your sex toy of the day. Or night, or whatever. I am worth a little more than that, thanks. Take your conceited ass back to your little goblin world and work off your urges elsewhere. I don't see why you bothered coming here at all," she finished, grumbling. "It's not like _you_ would have a problem finding women for your bed."

"Oh?" He smirked. _Oh, why, why don't I ever think before I speak? _She wailed to herself. Sarah jerked her eyes up to meet his again. Proximity to those lips could be deadly to a woman. "Now, why is that? Perhaps you are—what is the mortal word, ah, yes—projecting? Are you saying you find me rather irresistible, Sarah?"

She scowled and snapped back. "We're not talking about your looks." 

His eyes were laughing as he continued. "Ahh, so what else makes me irresistible to you? My wit and charm? My obvious skills as a lover?" She gritted her teeth and slid her hands under her thighs to avoid slapping him. The teasing light went out of his eyes briefly as he suddenly was at her ear, whispering, "The fact I can and do offer you your every dream?" To her horror, something warm worked its way through her body and made her squirm as his lips drifted too close to her ear.

She jumped in the chair and jerked away. "You are a conceited ass and that I can resist _very_ easily, thankyouverymuch."

"But you do not deny the rest." His eyes twinkled as he appeared before her again. _When did he become so happy?_ She blinked in confusion as he leaned away from her."My love, I see your dawn approaches and you are in need of rest before…I deprive you of it." He smirked deliciously again. _Damn him!_ "I will forego your enchanting company for the moment, but Sarah—"

"What?" she snapped, instantly regretting it.

"I will have you," he whispered, a finger caressing her lip. Sarah forgot to breathe and stared at him, feeling his eyes drift slowly over her face. The emotion in his eyes was unreadable as his fingertip traced her lips. Against her will, she found them parting, the tip of her tongue emerging for his thoughtful touch, and a tiny whimper escaped her. His eyes jumped abruptly to hers again. "Dream of me, love. I will dream of you."

The room was suddenly dark, quiet, and cool again. The music had vanished, the candles had gone, even the Christmas tree was dimmed, but the vicious ache within her had only increased in his absence. 

"Oh, God, why me?" Sarah moaned, turning her head into her hand. Her other hand fell from the arm of the chair onto her lap, knocking into an object there. She glanced down curiously and groaned. Prince Charming had, naturally, not forgotten to leave her slipper with her. And a rose.

"I hate him!"

* * *


	4. Mother Knows Best

With a lifetime's experience of hiding from certain individuals, Hoggle was the first to hear sounds in the corridor outside of the Queen's room. At first he heard something musical—_whistling?_—and then the most dreaded sound, the echoing footfalls of the High Prince's stride as he approached the Queen's private chamber. Panicked, Hoggle considered diving under the desk, but the Queen's hand on his shoulder restrained him.

"Come in, my dear," she called out after Jareth's knock. Hoggle moved closer to her skirt. If Jareth paid enough respect to his mum to knock at her door rather than just walking in, maybe he'd listen to her when she pleaded for Hoggle's life. He'd given up hope that the King's hunt had gone well, and he had no doubt at all about whom would be the first to pay for that.

The Goblin King entered with a strange expression on his face. Hoggle frantically tried to read it, to anticipate his sentence. It was almost…almost…as if the King were _pretending_ to be his usual reserved and disagreeable self. The dwarf trembled when Jareth's gaze paused on him. "Mother, Haggle," he greeted them coolly.

She matched his tone, unintimidated and unashamed. "Don't be rude, Jareth. His name is Hoggle and you know that quite well."

The Prince made a small sound of irritation. "Mother, now is not the time to try me."

"Try me, you mean," she responded imperiously. "I _am_ your mother." 

Now the Goblin King was obviously amused. His gaze flickered to Hoggle and back to his mother. "_Hoggle, _you may be excused."

The Queen looked as if she were about to argue, then stopped herself and gave the dwarf an encouraging push. Hoggle needed no such encouragement; he ran as quickly as he could for the door. 

Several times in Hoggle's life, he had been called a coward for that sort of reaction. But Hoggle did not lack courage. He may not have enjoyed staring death in the eye (and for that, one might call him wise), but he would risk himself for a friend.

And this concerned his friend. The Queen's promises or no, he had to find out what had happened, if Sarah was all right. 

So he did the right thing. He eavesdropped.

* * * 

The Queen spoke first. "Well?"

Hoggle heard the clink of glasses; he guessed Jareth was pouring himself some brandy. "Mother, you are incorrigible." His tone turned frosty. "But I have no intention of letting you interfere further into my private affairs than you already have." Leather creaked; no doubt the Goblin King had seated himself now.

"Such a pity," the Queen retorted. "It seems it required a little assistance for your _private affairs_ to progress, after all."

"_Mother_." The dwarf feared for the Queen as the High Prince hissed. 

"No, you will not 'Mother' me, my son. I have watched you mope about the Underground for years now and I will _not_ see my child suffering further."

"You do seem to forget I am a grown man now." Hoggle relaxed; humor had returned to the Prince's voice.

"You may no longer be a child, but you will always be my son." Hoggle looked at the door in admiration. 

A masculine groan of aggravation met Hoggle's ear. "Gods above, stop it. I cannot argue with you." 

"Then I suggest you don't."

"Have you no idea what you did today?" 

"I gave my son a second chance he foolishly had not sought out earlier." The dwarf heard a growl of protest, but the Queen continued. "You know quite well that I speak the truth. You wouldn't lift a finger to go after her, even though you haven't looked twice at another woman since she was first here—"

"Begging your pardon, _Mother_, but if you are to analyze my personal matters, do at least get the facts straight. _I _do not and have not suffered for female companionship." Hoggle raised a furry eyebrow; for the first time, Jareth sounded offended.

"Mounting women is not the same as caring for them." Hoggle heard a strangled, choking sound from within the room, followed by an odd noise, like a palm slapping something solid. "There, that's better." The Queen's voice paused. "Oh, Jareth, do look at what you've done now to my floor." There was a deep royal sigh. "I will have to send this rug to the laundry now, to get the brandy out." 

"Mother." Hoggle frowned at the door—the Goblin King's voice croaked? He heard the King clear his throat and start again. "Mother, as I was saying, my personal affairs are not your concern and I would rather you did not meddle with them."

"Or her, you mean."

There was a weary masculine sigh in the room. "Let it be, Mother. Just tell me this: are you intending to involve yourself further? As your own flesh and blood, should I not receive some fair warning of imminent attack?" Hoggle relaxed against the door—he knew the King had to be smiling as he said that. And smiling at his mother was not the same as smiling at a goblin to be sent to the Bog.

The Queen pressed her luck audaciously. "If I tell you, will you tell me about Sarah?"

There was another rumble of protest. "I should have expected as much."

Now their voices dropped to murmurs—Hoggle leaned in, listening to the quick exchanges.

"I _am_ your mother."

"As you always remind me."

"That's because you take after me, not your father."

"I'll be sure to tell him you said that. He'll be relieved."

"You are always so hard on him, Jareth."

"Mother, do you intend to solve all of the problems in my relationships today?"

"Does that mean I have solved one?" There was a split-second silence, but it was apparently incriminating enough for the Queen's satisfaction. She squealed delightedly. "Is she here, Jareth? Have you asked her to marry you yet? Oh, I'm so happy for you!"

"There is nothing to celebrate," the dwarf heard Jareth respond reluctantly. "These things take time, Mother."

She was muttering and Hoggle found it difficult to hear her; her could only catch the tail end of her words: "Not twelve years."

"Regardless." Jareth's voice was sharp; he was apparently irritated. "I treasure your affection, Mother, and I know you only wish the best for me, but I am asking you to stay out of this. The situation is delicate and I will not risk this." 

"Have you told her how you feel?" Jareth's groan of frustration was loud and pointed, but his mother ignored it, her voice rising in anxiety. "Jareth, don't tell me you ran over there and bowled the poor girl over without letting her know how you have felt all these years! Did you leave her thinking your interest was only because of the kiss?"

"As-I-said." From the tightness of his voice, Hoggle judged the High Prince was now speaking through clenched teeth. "The matter is delicate."

"But Jareth--!"

" 'But' nothing, Mother! I will handle this my way! I allowed circumstances to ruin it all before, I will not allow that to happen again. I will not play the fool for her again." His voice was low and now farther from Hoggle's ear; he must have jumped up and walked away from his mother. A sly tone crept into the Prince's voice. "No, I will handle this my way…or you will not hear a word more about her…"

"Blackmailer!" the Queen cried. 

"You did say I took after you," he answered with a surprisingly sweet tone.

She heaved a sigh, sulking. "Very well, then. You may carry on as you please. But she is a lovely girl, I must say, Jareth." Hoggle, not usually sympathetic to Jareth, rolled his eyes. The Queen was blatantly fishing. From the Prince's pointed silence, it was apparent her son was aware of this and refusing to cooperate. "Oh, fine!" she huffed. Hoggle heard the distinctive clink of her tea cup as it was placed on the table. Now her voice was lower and tender again. "Do tell me at least it went well. You know I worry."

Leather protested loudly as a body apparently dropped into a chair. Hoggle strained to hear. After a pause, Jareth said quietly, "It is too soon to say…though I did leave…encouraged…" His voice trailed off as his mother emitted a suppressed squeak of joy. "And now that's all the gossip I will share with you," Jareth said brusquely. "Or your minion, as I know you well enough to know you'll tell your assistant everything," he added pointedly. Hoggle was briefly alarmed at this reference to himself, but the King's voice turned jesting: "Is it not enough that you intervene in my private matters but that you resort to stealing my staff, too?"

"Only for your best interests, my son." 

"Mother!"

"Did I tell you your Aunt Morgaine wrote me…" and as the Queen's voice drifted off into a family tale, Hoggle turned from the door, not quite satisfied. Whether because of his natural inclination to privacy, a gentlemanly respect for Sarah, or to cover up his misdeeds, Jareth had been far too vague for Hoggle's satisfaction. The Goblin King would never lie to his mother, Hoggle had no doubt about that, but Jareth had a way of getting around words. The dwarf grunted to himself. There was only one thing to do, no matter how he trembled at the idea: see Sarah.

* * * 

The worst anger is when you can't be angry. Such was Sarah's predicament as she faced the dwarf and his earnest eyes. When he emerged from the mirror, she had turned away at once to control her temper before she spoke; Hoggle's confession, however, took even the solace of a tantrum from her. 

"Sarah, please, please, tell me yer all right. I didn't mean no harm. I only wants ya to be happy. An' I thought you were set on 'Is Majesty."

She drummed her fist on the vanity before speaking. "Oh, Hoggle, I know…I know." She sighed ruefully. "It may not be the best of situations, but I forgive you." _Tis the season_, she thought to herself grimly.

"Best of--? Sarah, what happened? I heard _him_ talking to his mum--he didn't seem mad at you at all." 

_Oh, great, he's preening. _She rubbed her tired eyes and turned back to Hoggle. "Nothing happened, Hoggle. For some reason, he—"—she colored; how could you tell Hoggle, or anyone, about Jareth's suggestive behavior?—"—he, um, wants me to come to the Underground. He wouldn't take no for an answer, but he left, so I suppose I won that round."

"He'll be back," Hoggle said darkly. "He always fancied ya, Sarah. His mum thinks he ain't never been set on anybody as he's set on you."

Sarah found herself unable to explain to Hoggle that a man's sudden and very physical interest in a woman did not always have anything to do with "being set" on her. Not in the way Hoggle thought, anyway. She shrugged, blushing. "I don't think that's quite accurate…He was just, er, _entertained_ by our run-in at the party, I think."

"Oh, you're wrong there, girlie. Even I knows better. That's why his mum and I did it, we thoughts you were taken with him, too…" Hoggle frowned. "You sure you ain't?"

No amount of acting classes could have saved her from blushing scarlet in response to Hoggle's sudden question. "Hoggle! He's the _Goblin King! _He stole my brother! And all he wanted from me was a—a—"—she stammered before the dwarf's innocent eyes—"—a _good night_," she finished lamely. 

Her language was more polite than the vocabulary in her head, but the dwarf still comprehended her meaning. He exclaimed, outraged, "He didn't treat you like no lady?"

_Maybe not a lady, but he certainly did treat me like a woman_, Sarah's subversive mind piped up. She groaned and waved her hands in a pacifying gesture to Hoggle. "No…not quite that, there's no need to get upset. It was just…a game for him, and now it's done, he's gone away, and there's nothing to worry about."

Hoggle shook his head. "Missy, you're livin' in dreams again if you think Jareth is gonna just leave ya. I've never seen him act like he did yesterday or today."

"Oh, please, I don't matter to him," she snorted in disgust. 

"Wait'll he comes back, then, and you'll see. I just don't want you foolin' yourself, Sarah. Not about _him_. He ain't always sweetness and roses, that's for sure."

She grabbed his shoulders in alarm. "Hoggle, he hasn't threatened or harmed you, has he?"

"Nah, not yet. But I try not to give him the chance to do it—I stays away from him as much as possible."

She tilted her head down, her voice subdued and apologetic. "Oh, Hoggle, I'm so sorry. I hate the fact you're exposed to any risk or problems because of me…it's not right. It's not fair. I wish Jareth would let you alone."

"Thens ask him."

"Excuse me? _Ask _him?"

The dwarf shrugged. "You've got more control of 'is Majesty than you think, Sarah. He listens to them valuable to him, and ain't many he'd listen to over you." Hoggle looked at her pointedly. "Ask him for somethin' and see." 

"He was hardly _generous_ before, if that's what you mean—taking Toby, Hoggle! I don't think I want another one of his little presents with strings attached. "

He shrugged again. "That was different, Sarah—you were playing the game, it wasn't just you and him. 'Sides, I figure he wouldn't take too kindly to the idea of you leaving. Nah, he wouldn't want to grant that wish. Ask him for something else now and see for yourself. I thinks he'd do a lot for you. You're the rat's soft spot." He glanced to the mirror, listening. "Ahhh, no, Her Majesty is wanting me, Sarah. I'll check on you soon. And if you need anything…" The dwarf disappeared into the mirror with a wink and a wave, leaving Sarah alone to ponder his words.

* * *


	5. Shameless Smut

For several days, Sarah tip-toed about her apartment, wary of a stereo bursting into seductive song, or a sudden ignition of either candles or hormones. But nothing happened. This should have made her relax, but as Sarah knew from experience that the Goblin King did not give promises lightly, she only grew increasingly tense. 

So it was that Sarah was wandering her apartment that Saturday night, slightly buzzed after her fourth Bailey's in a row, but otherwise managing to function. Functioning in this case meant making a blizzard of wrapping paper and bags in her living room as she finally confronted the loathsome chore of giftwrap. 

"I don't see why I bother getting Karen anything, she's just going to criticize it anyway," she muttered to herself, slamming a bow on a box and tossing it to the side. She stretched and regarded the growing pile beneath the tree. "Dad's done, Mom's done, I'll pick up Karen's candy tomorrow, and where did I put Toby's stuff?" 

Naturally, as all last presents manage to do, Toby's gift had gone AWOL. After wasting half an hour digging through her discarded shopping bags, Sarah retreated to her bedroom to check one of her storage spots.

She hadn't been thinking about the Underworld, and its troublesome occupants, at all. That was her mistake. That was why she was completely taken by surprise when she opened her door, and found one Goblin King on her bed, awaiting her.

* * * 

Lounging hardly described his body posture. He was lying on his side, black-booted legs fully stretched out, and resting his weight on his bent left elbow. Her mouth opened further as she saw his white poet's blouse was completely undone and parted invitingly, practically falling off his chest altogether. Just the proper position to be ripped off, actually, she couldn't help thinking. He had a rose in his left hand, which he was drawing slowly from his upper thigh through his chest as he regarded her, eyes smoldering, devilish mouth curving.

He looked ridiculous, a Harlequin novel cover sprawled out on her bed.

He also looked unspeakably sexy.

* * *

"What—the hell—are you doing?" Sarah finally gasped, nails digging into her palms to keep them from reaching for him. 

He laughed and smirked openly at her as she unsubtly brushed her chin for drool. "Waiting for you, of course. I was, I admit, a bit inspired by some of your reading literature here." Time went into slow-motion as his other hand, which had been draped across his hip and behind his legs, lifted to produce the trashy romance novel she'd left under the bedskirt. "This fine work—ahh, yes, the quite educational _Passion's Pleasures." _His fine eyebrows arched delicately at her. Sarah's heart, which had already been running on overdrive, now stopped cold with mortification. _Oh, God, oh, God…_Seconds felt like days as Sarah heard Jareth begin to read from the book. " 'He awaited her in her boudoir, broiling within with desire." He didn't look up from the book but she saw his cheek quirk. " That certainly must be uncomfortable. 'Alexandra rushed to his manly embrace and was not disappointed. The dark Lord Robert tore her bodice open, splitting the dress down to the skirt.' Quite a strong fellow, I gather," he interjected, his eyes appearing over the edge of the book to wink at her before he resumed reading. " ' 'Take me now, make mad passionate love to me, Lord Robert. My maidenhood is yours!' Alexandra cried, large bosoms heaving.' Mmm, lucky fellow, for the bosoms if not the brain, at least. 'The mysterious noble responded savagely. Alexandra moaned in ecstatic bliss as he revealed his—"—there was no mistaking the elegant lift of his eyebrows—"— 'enormous, throbbing'—oh, is _that_ what they call it now?" He lifted his face from the pages and offered her a taunting grin. "Really, Sarah, why do women settle for so _little_?" 

Sarah had been standing with her hands to her mouth in horror. A car accident. That time in high school when her best friend blurted out her crush on a guy, right in front of him. An executioner announcing her sentence. Her father attempting to explain male-female relations. All of these she would have found more comfortable than the exquisite embarrassment of having Jareth not only come upon, but actually recite, her secret trashy Harlequin. It didn't matter in that minute if the market for base, smut-filled romances was enormous and composed of perfectly respectable people. It did matter that the object of her erotic fantasies now had an idea about the action in them. 

Without thinking, she cried out and rushed at the bed before he could read further. Had Sarah thought, she would have realized the futility of this gesture. She landed on the bed, her hand on the book but both of her wrists held against the bedspread by a very amused Goblin King. "Why, Sarah, I had no idea such books reduced you to—what was it?—ahh, yes, 'broiling within with desire.' Compose yourself, my dear, lest I suspect your bosoms are heaving and 'respond savagely.' " 

She struggled furiously for a second before she stilled in his hands. "I hate you!" He grinned and released her, swinging his legs off the bed and stepping away, giving her space to calm her gasping—never heaving!—breaths. "Who the hell do you think you are and how dare you go through my belongings!" He had hardly "gone through" anything, she knew—the book was just tossed under the edge of the bed—but being fair was hardly a priority for Sarah at this moment. She jumped off the bed, stomping her foot as she stood before him. "What kind of sicko are you?"

The amusement in his eyes darkened and disappeared as he walked toward her. Her back hit the wall and he braced a palm on either side of her, pinning her there. He leaned forward, his face all planes and sharp, angry angles. "I am a king, Sarah. You will remember that fact. Do not try me." 

Sarah had lifted her hands to push him away, but hesitated. The white shirt he'd opened was now dripping down his arms like icing, exposing all of his upper body to her eyes. She couldn't bring herself to actually place her hands against his bare pectorals or, God forbid, that abdomen. Because he was the most horrible man in the universe, of course, he had to notice where her eyes were directed. "You approve, I gather? I would hate to suffer in comparison to Lord Robert. In any respect," he murmured to her ear, brushing his body against hers, causing her to jump.

Sarah closed her eyes, forced herself to put her fingertips gingerly against his skin—_oh, God, why does he have to feel so damn good_—and push. _"_You're being a conceited ass and I don't have time for this." The naked skin beneath her fingers didn't budge. _Listens to me, my ass, Hoggle_. She bit her lip, gritted her teeth, and switched to more unpleasant tactics, like courtesy. "Please let me go, I really do have a lot to do. It's the day before Christmas Eve and I _have_ to get this done by tomorrow." She hadn't expected a reaction, but to her shock, he did step back with a mocking bow.

"As my lady requests." She blinked: When did he put his shirt back on properly? Not that she was sorry for the change, of course.

She walked to her closet, rooted in it, and grabbed the bag with Toby's gift. Without another word, she left the bedroom for the living room. She groaned inside as a familiar boot-tap came from behind her. Of course, he wouldn't just leave.

"If you're going to stay, you have to help," she barked, tossing him a roll of tape as she dropped to the floor. 

Not intimidated by her threat of manual labor, he eased down to a spot in front of the tree and presents. _Almost as if he's a present himself_, she snorted to herself. "And what precisely are you doing?" 

"Wrapping presents. I've been at it all morning." Why was she talking to him as though his very presence wasn't outrageous? _I've obviously had too much to drink. _She yawned and tossed some rolls of wallpaper around to look for the scissors. 

"And night."

"What?" she asked, bewildered. To her unease, he crawled over the jungle of wrapping, bags, and bows on all fours towards her, eyes on her all the way. His fingers slid her face toward him, examining her face with all the focus of a jeweler studying a diamond for flaws. 

"You haven't slept." It wasn't a question. He knelt before her and his forefinger touched the area beneath her eyes. "How long have you been without sleep, Sarah?"

_Since you returned to my life_, she wanted to say, but she shrugged and tried to lift his hands from her face. She succeeded in capturing his hands, but they refused to let go of hers. "It's been a while….I've had a lot to do." She shrugged again. "I'll catch up after Christmas."

"I think not." She was in his arms before she knew it, and he was rising. 

"Not again! Jareth, put me down! I have to—"

"It's done." He turned in the doorway with her so that she could see the wasteland of giftwrap had disappeared, with a stack of wrapped presents beneath the tree. "Satisfied?"

"You could really make a killing at a mall with that, you know," Sarah found herself mumbling.

"Beg your pardon?" His face was turned toward hers and she hated that. It was much, much too easy to remember his kiss when his face was a few inches from hers.

"Nothing. Look, thanks for the help, but you can put me down now. Just because I don't apparently measure up to your beauty requirements doesn't give you the right to treat me like your child."

He stopped mid-stride in the darkened hallway. "Do you want me to kiss you?"

"No!"

"Then don't tempt me." He carried her through the bedroom door and deposited her on the bed. Before she could protest, the covers had been pulled over her, and she felt the weight of a Goblin King as he sat by her hip. "Sleep now, Sarah. We will talk later." She opened her mouth to argue, but his gloved hand passed over her suddenly heavy eyes, plunging her into the depths of sleep.

* * *


	6. Sweet Dreams Are Made of This

It was a beautiful dream, she thought, hazily peering out at the room from her satin pillow. But shouldn't she have expected as much? Until this point in her life, no nocturnal vision had ever been as lifelike and vivid as the ballroom dream he'd given her when she first went through his Labyrinth. But now here she was, under the influence of the Goblin King yet again, and once more experiencing an incredibly realistic fantasy…_Even if I have no idea where he got this one_.

She was in a beautiful blue and white bedroom, lit dimly by sun streaming through a shrouded window. She was lying on top of a giant bed. It was the softest bed she'd ever been in, she thought, lazily sliding a leg against the satin bedding; from the jumble of fabric at her ankles, she'd apparently kicked back the covers over her. She heard behind her the crackle of a fire, filling the room with a lulling warmth. She stretched with closed eyes, extending arms and legs alongside her body before melting into the mattress again. Even her pajamas took comfort to a sinful level; she could feel them, small satin shorts and matching halter top, loose and gliding over her skin as compared to the rough flannel shorts, stained T-shirt (and battered bra) she'd been wearing earlier. "Mmmm." She turned her head on the pillow and cracked open her eyes slowly again. Jareth was about three feet from her on the bed, lying on his side, head in hand. _Of course. Different setting in this dream, but same star. _He was regarding her thoughtfully, apparently unaware of how the sun gilded his fair hair and made him look almost angelic. _So is he Prince Charming again in this dream or an angel? Wonder what's on tap this time…_She smiled at him and after a pause, his lips curved slowly in response; her pulse picked up.She shivered deliciously. _I must have done something right if it's going to be one of _those_ dreams._

"Good morning, sleeping beauty," he said softly, not taking his eyes from her; every centimeter of her skin warmed under those eyes.

"This is a dream," she murmured into the pillow, running her gaze over him.

"Do you dream of me often then?" he responded, tilting his head with That Smirk.

She slid her legs straight behind her, pushed her toes into the mattress, and stretched her calves. His eyes flickered from her legs to her eyes again. She moved her arm around her face, watching him over the crook of her elbow and adjusting her head on the pillow again to look at him sideways. Still silent and feeling no need to hurry, her eyes slid over to watch her fingers drift lazily against the pillowcase; she extended the moment as long as she could, reveling in the feeling of his gaze sweeping over her like a long caress. _Hey, it's a dream, you danced with him before, who said you can't flirt this time? _Raising her eyelashes slowly to look over at him, she sighed and stretched again. "Why should I tell you, you already know…" 

He merely continued to smile at her, beneath eyes half-closed. "Perhaps." She saw his eyes drift over her bare arm, to the skin of her side where the top ended. He seemed to hesitate, but as their eyes met, he slid closer. His gloved hand extended cautiously, hesitated, and then landed softly on her lower back, making small circles there. The thin fabric of her top rippled slowly, so slowly under his palm as his murmur drifted down to her ear. "The rest seems to have agreed with you…How do you feel now, my lovely?"

"Wonderful…" His hand stopped as she purred and eyes no longer languid studied her face sharply. 

"Sarah? Are you quite all right?"

"I'm fine…fine…don't stop…mmmm…soo…to the right, up, right there, great…where are we?" she mumbled into her pillow, eyes closing as the hand traced small circles over her spine. __

"So you know we are not in your home." His voice was distant and careful.

"Duh…mmm…I'm not…an idiot…"

"I think not." A pause from above her. "You don't seem quite yourself, Sarah. You are usually not…" The voice broke off as she purred again, arched her back beneath him, and curled her calves back, flexing her toes. He coughed. "You are usually not so…relaxed."

"Maybe I want to be…relaxed," she murmured, turning her head from the pillow so she could regard him with an inviting grin. He wasn't typically so reluctant in her usual fantasies. Hell, the conversation was usually one-tenth of this, although if it felt this real so far, she couldn't imagine how real it would feel when the _real_ action began…She couldn't help a shiver of anticipation. _Well, why wait any longer? Let's give him a little prompting…_She gave him her most inviting smile. He arched an eyebrow for her and responded with his own smoldering, if slightly questioning, look. _Question? Here's your answer, Hot Stuff. _She reached back slowly with one hand, keeping her eyes locked with his, and drew his hand farther down, over her rear. 

She'd never seen Jareth look floored before and she giggled. His hand had jerked back from her shorts as if she were a stove that would burn him, for pete's sake; she had to physically hold his hand on the fabric, still smiling, waiting for the invitation to register. _Well, this is a new one in the dreambook…Dreamboat turning shy! And damn, if he's not adorable when he's flustered. Note to self: shock Jareth into cuteness in dreams often. _

It took several attempts before he could speak again. He stared at her hard, his body frozen in place. "And to what…to what do I owe this unprecedented honor?"

"Just…thought…I'd make up for the other day…when I…you know." She giggled into the pillow again. 

"You certainly do know how to apologize, Sarah," he breathed finally. She glanced at him over her shoulder. His head was bent so she couldn't really see his expression, just the sun playing on his hair. She eased off his hand but refused to let him pull away again. After a moment, his hand was drifting lightly over her shorts, just enough of a touch to follow the curve of her body and make her shiver. _I knew he'd get the point eventually_. Yet the hand snapped back and his voice was brisk when he spoke next. "But I don't think you quite mean this…"

"Why don't you believe me?" she burst out, angry and impatient. Since when did her dreams present her with a reluctant lover? Why wouldn't he just get down to business? _If I wanted to be turned on by him and have no way to fulfill it, I'd just have stayed awake, damn it. _She flipped her head away from him in frustration. _"_Don't you believe me or aren't you interested?" she asked bitterly. _Shot down in my freakin' dreams, of all places._ _He thinks I'm a joke even here. _Self-pitying tears stung beneath her eyelids against her will; one escaped her lashes and slipped down her face before she could stop it.

She jumped slightly as she felt a breath by her ear. "Make that very interested, love," he murmured, and she sighed as his tongue touched her ear. Her sigh turned to a yelp, though, as she felt his hands at her waist, the world rotating, and then the world settled so that she was lying on top of the chest and body of a smirking Goblin King. She lifted herself on her forearms to look at him in confusion. 

He grinned wolfishly. "If you wished to apologize, you only paid half the debt." She gasped as both gloved hands slid down past her hips. His eyes gleamed playfully. "It was more like this, wasn't it?"

She giggled and lowered her head to his chest, quickly wiping her eyes. _From hell to heaven…This is more like it._ She made a noise of protest as the hands retreated; compromising, he lifted one and left the other fingers playing lightly over her back, tingling nerves she hadn't known existed. His lips curled wickedly. "Now do you doubt my intentions?" His arm bent back and slid to prop up his head as he gazed down at her. 

She gave a quiet, pleased laugh and watched as his smile softened. Unlike all of her other dreams, he still hadn't really made a move, but given their promising position, Sarah wasn't complaining anymore. She regarded him silently over folded arms, playing with one of the buttons of his shirt beneath her fingers. He smiled back with a warmth as comforting as his chest beneath her before his fingers gently drew her eyelids shut. "Now I think you need to sleep more, my love." 

She turned her head silently and felt his free hand glide back to stroke her hair. Suddenly, a lovely ease filled her, like a massage from within. So he wasn't going to ravish her wildly like in her normal dreams—somehow, this felt just as good, because it felt so very real, so very lovely…She wanted badly to drift off against his warmth, but a question nagged at her. _I was going to ask him something, what was it I was supposed to ask him…Remember, Williams, remember…Oh, yes…_"Jareth…" she murmured.

"Sarah…" he murmured back affectionately. "What is it?"

"Jareth…would you do me a favor?"

"Tell me what it is. May I suggest certain kinds of favors?" His gloved finger slid teasingly along the spaghetti strap of her halter top, tracing the skin there. She laughed again and reached across with one of her hands, pulling the strap aside to invite further exploration. Alas, the magical fingers did no more than drift reverently over her shoulder and neck. The voice above her now was quiet and tender. "Tell me what you desire of me, Sarah, and if it is in my power, you shall have it." 

"Will you be nice to Hoggle?" she mumbled into her forearms. 

His chest rumbled beneath her as he exclaimed in surprise. She whined as the hand stilled. "_Hoggle? _Why on the Underground are you thinking of that dwarf—"---she reached back with her hand and moved his, silently asking him to return to his light strokes; his voice turned soft again. "—at a time like this?" 

"...my friend…" she murmured, already sinking into sleep. She shifted slightly against him, snuggling in. 

She heard him sigh in defeat before the world slipped away. "As you wish, love."

* * * 

An enormous crash ripped Sarah from her sleep. She snapped upright in bed, looking for the source of the sound, and promptly slammed a hand over her mouth to suppress her scream. Or screams, because as Sarah looked around herself, she saw a great deal to scream about.

She was in a blue and white room. _The_ blue and white room, from the dream. She was wearing the silken pajama set from the dream; a strap had slid over her shoulder, just as when…She gasped. She would begin to hyperventilate if she had any freakin' idea how to. _The clothes are just like when I threw myself practically all over him, oh, my God, oh, my God, oh my God, and I thought him finding my smut book was humiliating…Why didn't he stop me? Why the fu--Oh, dear God, what will he say?!…_Her throat closed suddenly in anticipation of what _he_ would say, the very worst person to catch her in such a humiliating, unthinkable state.

Jareth. Forget hyperventilating; she stopped breathing. _What if—what if—_her mind froze over, refusing to allow the thought to pass. Not turning her head, her eyes slid, very, very slowly, to the side, bracing to see the unthinkable. Relief gushed through her as she saw the Goblin King was not there; she would not have to face his mockery just yet. _Don't go there, Williams_. She couldn't even begin to think about that.

A slight noise made her whip her head to the other side, to meet--

--a joyful gaze? Sarah clutched the bedding automatically to her chest, finding herself the object of scrutiny. 

It wasn't Jareth, but this situation still could be bad, very bad, she decided, noting the way the older woman had been smirking triumphantly before their gazes met. _That_ was far too familiar. 

The woman attempted to suppress her enormous smile with a more serious expression, but failed entirely. She stooped to pick up a book—the source of the sound, Sarah guessed distantly—and smiled brightly at the girl in the bed. "Oh, my dear, I am so sorry to disturb you. I meant to leave this book for my son and of course, I had no idea--you must excuse me, I had no idea you were here—I had no intention of violating your privacy." When Sarah nodded automatically, to reassure the woman, she fairly bubbled over with delight. She clapped her hands together lightly as she approached the bed. Impulsively, she patted Sarah's foot through the blankets with apparent affection. "I do hope we can grow better acquainted later, Sarah, but I must say I am so, so very happy that you've decided to visit with us. I'm sure you've no idea how happy you've made us all." Another dazzling smile. "You just relax now and I'll find that son of mine for you. Not that he will need much encouragement, I'm sure!" She winked outrageously as she placed the book on a nearby desktop, and disappeared abruptly in a familiar shower of glitter.

At that moment, Sarah was as close to relaxation as she was to winning the lottery. She was dimly aware of her hangover headache, but the more unbearable suffering was remembering the little tête-à-tête that had occurred in this bedroom earlier. Whenever that was, because she had no idea what time or even day it was. A lump of burning, panicked tears rose in her throat; she gave way to a good long cry before she could manage to think again and begin to assess her situation. _I'm in the Goblin King's bed. I apparently made the ass of the year—no, century—make that the damn MILLENIUM!--of myself and he let me do it. _She cringed, trying not to recall any of it. _And now his mother thinks I'm not only having sex with her son—dear God! _Sarah squeezed her eyes shut with mortification. _I practically begged him for it…Oh, my God. Even if I thought it was a dream, God, now he knows how I've been thinking of him—God, if you have mercy, give me amnesia now! _No merciful lighting bolt, or falling flower pot, struck her, so she plowed on, thoughts rushing frantically within her. _I can't think more about that. What was it she said? Does she think I actually wanted to be here? That I'll stay? Am I his prisoner? Hell, no!_

"I see you are awake." At the undoubtedly masculine voice, Sarah gasped and clutched the sheets more tightly to her chest. She turned to glare at the doorway, where he leaned with studied nonchalance against the frame. His face was a mask, but Jareth's eyes were alert and locked on her, waiting for her response.

It was not long in coming; Sarah shouted as she jumped from the bed to confront him. 

"YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

* * *


	7. The Kindness of Strangers

Sarah had learned a great deal about Jareth, King of Goblins, during her thirteen hours in the Labyrinth. One lesson she'd received quite painfully was that angering him resulted in bad, bad things, like, oh, say, potential death. So as furious as she was now, she couldn't help but quail inside as he stormed upwards to her, his hand swinging up to grip her chin with just enough pressure to remind her of his overpowering strength. 

"You foolish, ungrateful girl," he growled through clenched teeth. "Mind your tongue or I might mind it for you." She tried to tug away, but his fingers held her easily. "Must you always be difficult?" She shivered from the ice in his voice, despite the fire in the room. "I will warn you only once, Sarah. We are under my mother's roof and I will not stand for any discourtesy to her. Nor will I endure petty insults. Do not make the mistake of speaking to me in that way again."

His fingers opened, he threw down his hand, and he stalked over to the window. Thoroughly bewildered by his hostile attitude despite her own anger, Sarah followed. "How do you expect me to react, Jareth? I wake up in a stranger's bed, in God-knows-where, in clothes that aren't mine, and…and…and…"

His head turned to her, regarding her with cold amusement. "And, and? I assume you shall say next I forced myself upon you. How typical." She saw his gloved hands fist as he whirled away, moving to a chair by the fire where he took his seat. The reflection of flames played in his eyes as he swung a riding crop repeatedly against his boot, strong enough, Sarah thought, that he had to feel the sting. Silence extended minutes in the darkened room, as Sarah stood, awkwardly glancing over at the Goblin King and feeling an odd sense of guilt overwhelming her.

Finally, she bit her lip and forced herself to say the obvious, even though the idea of making any kind of concession to the asshole was nauseating. "I never said you took advantage of me. You're the one who made that up." It was true, she realized. _I gave him a lot of opportunities, hell, I nearly forced myself on him…but he never really did anything…I was the one way over the line…He put me to sleep when I was really coming on to him..._She winced and tried to scrub the memory from her brain. _Damn alcohol! Damn Underground! Damn whatever was in my head that made me act that way! Damn him for being so—arrgh!_

There was another heavy silence as Sarah mentally ticked off, and cursed, the components of Jareth's physical attractiveness. Finally, she shivered slightly and glanced around for something with which to cover herself. 

"There's a robe in the wardrobe to the left."

She jumped at Jareth's sudden speech. "What?"

He rose; with a weary motion of his hand, a robe appeared on his fingers and he held it out to her. His expression held neither rage nor amusement. It was an exhausted medium that mysteriously stung Sarah within, pressed down on her chest like the urge to cry. Looking down, she muttered, "I—I didn't mean to imply—" 

"I know." He extended the robe to her a slight warmth returning to his eyes. Sarah took the robe from him tentatively; it had to be made for a man, she guessed, as it was enormous on her, puddling on the floor at her feet. Flapping her arms out instinctively to adjust the sleeves, she attempted in vain to pull them up over her wrists. She glanced up at Jareth just in time to catch a small twitch at the corner of his mouth. 

"It's mine," he murmured.

"I beg your pardon?"

His gaze lifted and focused, meeting hers. "The robe is mine. Hence the…difficulties." His mouth twitched again.

She self-consciously adjusted the belt. _I should have guessed, his scent is all over it_. "So why was it here? Because you're a guest for the party?"

"Yes and no." He leaned against the bedpost casually. "My mother maintains permanent chambers here for me, prepared for whenever I choose to visit. And I brought you here," he continued, interrupting the question on her lips, "because it is far more restful than the noisebox in which you live, as you yourself will admit. It was simply not possible to let you rest Aboveground. Had you stayed there, your mortal time still would be passing, and you yourself had said you could not afford a loss of time just now. So you became the guest of my realm." He swept her a mocking bow before resuming. "I did not take you to the Goblin Castle because it is not as quiet as the Queen's, for obvious reasons." His raised eyebrow reminded Sarah of the hordes of goblins running and screaming about the hygiene disaster that was the Goblin Castle. "And I thought you would be needlessly panicked to awaken there." He turned his head from her to look out of the window. 

_Was that an explanation? Did the Goblin King, prince of riddles and arrogance himself, actually lower himself to give me a straight answer for once? _ Sarah opened her mouth but could find no sarcastic response. "Oh." Why did she feel like a heel? She was the one abducted and allowed to make a fool of herself over this man! Besides, his "explanation" was hardly persuasive. She eyed him doubtfully. "So you brought me here…to sleep."

"Yes," he answered simply. His gaze flickered over to her. "And the attire is your own. I asked your mind for what was most comfortable for you and this is what it produced." He gestured with his hand at her. "You might want to have better knowledge of your closets."

She bit her tongue to stop the sharp commentary ready to spill out of her. "So why were you in the bed, Jareth? You ask me to imagine you _abducted_ me," she stressed, "out of the kindness of your heart, and yet I apparently woke up with you in bed with me!"

A small, devilish smile played on his lips. She trembled within at that expression; it was far worse than any verbal torment he could have inflicted on her. "Why, yes, you did, didn't you?" he drawled nonchalantly. He strolled over to her, placing a hand against his desk and leaning over her. "You were rather pleased by that, if memory serves me correctly." She blushed thoroughly beneath the heated light in his eyes. As if encouraged by the memory, he leaned more boldly close to her. "Don't ask a man dying of thirst to resist water, my darling," he whispered suddenly. He lifted his head to look her in the eye, smirking slightly at her rapid breathing. "And as for the kindness of my heart, I never said my intentions towards you were _kindly_." 

She ducked away from him. "I thought I was dreaming and you knew it! Don't ask me to believe you're blameless there!" 

He stalked after her as she rounded the bed, edging away from him. "I admit no blame but taking a great deal of pleasure in your company." Her back hit the wall by the headboard. _Damn_. He was leaning over her again. "And as I recall, it certainly seemed you were desiring to take pleasure in mine…Can it be you are rethinking your position, my dear?" He smiled, baring the tips of his pointed teeth. His voice became a molten whisper. "You have no reason to deny us now, love. Why should we not have our _dreams_ in reality?" He bent his head lower, his eyes consuming her. 

She managed at the last moment to slip her hand up between his mouth and her face as he leaned to kiss her. His eyes were amused as he moved his lips slowly against her palm. _Great, just stick your hand in a tiger's mouth next time, Sarah_. She ignored the invitation with difficulty and rallied her defenses. "Jareth, as I told you before, I have a lot to do at home. I cannot and will not be your—your—"—she glanced at the bed and then back to him; his eyes sparkled knowingly—"—_playmate_, just because it's convenient for you. And frankly, I think you have your own family matters to take care of, since your mom apparently now thinks we're sleeping together and is probably telling everyone in sight."

His eyebrows shot up and he pulled back abruptly. "I beg your pardon?"

She wrapped her arms defensively across her chest. "Don't even pretend she didn't say anything. I have a psychotic stepmother and I know they don't gloat in private." 

He ignored her commentary. "What happened, Sarah?" His voice was cool and demanding.

"_Well_," she said venomously, with exaggerated relish, "I woke up because it turns out _your mother_ came in here to drop something off and _she_ happened to see _me_ here and she drew her own conclusions." She looked at Jareth significantly. "Just imagine how lovely a moment _that _was."

He stepped back from her, glancing away, his face as expressionless and cold as a marble statue of a Greek god. "And what, pray tell, did my lovely mother have to say to you?" he inquired frostily.

_Why is he getting snitty with me? You'd think he'd caught me going through his drawers or something. _Annoyed, she responded without thought. "Don't get mad at me because you dumped me here and your mom walked in!" 

His eyebrow arched and he waved a hand dismissively. "You will answer the question."

Hers rose in sarcastic imitation. "Will I?" His eyes slitted and she backpedaled slightly. _Oh, well, what the hell. I'd be freaked out too if Karen walked in on us—what the hell am I thinking? There's no "us" for Karen to walk in on!_ Reddening, she shrugged and continued. "Not much—just that she wants to get to know me and that she's so happy I am apparently here for a 'visit.' " Sarah shot Jareth a pointed look. "She left to go find you."

He closed his eyes briefly. _Was that relief?_ "I see." 

"What's going on?" she asked slowly.

"Nothing for you to be concerned about," he answered briskly, rotating on his heel to face her full-on. 

She cut him off before he could say anything more or, God forbid, attempt anything more. "Jareth, I need to go home to my family. It's Christmas," she heard herself blurting out plaintively.

"Of course," he murmured, eyes locked with hers. He was smiling again. She was so startled by his easy agreement that she almost doubted if she had heard him correctly, but he was continuing to speak. "And now that you've had a holiday from your holiday, you are sufficiently refreshed to enjoy it. Consider this another gift of mine to you." He smirked outright.

She scowled, unable to deny he had actually helped her out, if in a completely bizarre way. "But the time—"

"As I told you before, I will not take your holiday time from you. When you awaken, it will be only a minute after I left you there," He stepped up to her swiftly, his thin lips brushing her forehead before she could jerk away. "As now you leave me. Sweet dreams, my Sarah."

And once again, the world dissolved. _Damn him…_

* * *

This time, there was no warning whistle or musical footfalls in the hallway outside of the Queen's study. Hoggle had been seated on a stool before his Queen, his hands obscured by the blue yarn she was looping around them to form a skein, when a sharp, perfunctory knock rattled the door before it flew open, slamming the wall behind it. 

"Mother," the Goblin King snarled. "I believe there has been a misunderstanding between us." The door slammed shut of its own accord behind the High Prince. Hoggle glanced at it anxiously. His hands were caught in the Queen's yarn; even if he had the nerve to chance the outrage of both royals by dashing out of the room without permission, he was still literally tied to his mistress's side.

The Goblin King placed his hands on the back of a chair, gripping it so tightly that it seemed on the verge of giving way. "Did you or did you not assure me you would keep away from Sarah?"

The dwarf exhaled softly. _So _that _is why she's been in such a good mood—she must've been up to something. And from the looks o' things, Jareth is mad as all get out over it. _Hoggle glanced fearfully at the Queen; her brow had furrowed in puzzlement, but she still seemed calm. How she managed to do this before her son's blazing temper, Hoggle had no idea. _What has she done? _

"Jareth, do tell me what justifies barging into my quarters in such a vile temper." The Prince's nostrils flared ominously, but his mother ignored him and went on. "I did see your lady friend, yes, but it was hardly planned." She titled her head. "Did she not tell you? I was returning to you that book you are always leaving around here, the one your father gave you, about self-restraint." She gestured to the door with your head. "It's on your desk, if you had bothered to look before flying into here. Now, what is this about? I hardly think you're embarrassed by our encounter—I am well aware that are a grown man with a private life—" Hoggle's bushy eyebrows rose. He wasn't sure what had happened, if he particularly wanted to know, or what it boded for Sarah. Why hadn't the Queen told him she'd seen Sarah? And why was the Goblin King so sore about it?

"_Mother_," Jareth hissed, for the first time his eyes darting over to Hoggle. 

She followed his gaze and shrugged. "You began this, son. And I hardly think Hoggle will think badly of Sarah if we simply state the truth, that you two—"

_"Stop." _Hoggle had never heard Jareth use _that_ tone to his mother, the one usually uttered right before he dispatched some unfortunate to the Bog of Eternal Stench. She could provoke him to his limits but he had never come near to conveying any threat to her before. Now Hoggle quailed openly for her, for Sarah, and for himself. Unseen by the two Fae, he tugged fruitlessly at the yarn imprisoning his hands.

Rather than looking afraid, however, the Queen's face registered a brief hurt. The Prince closed his eyes as if angry with himself, breathed out slowly, jaw tight. "Mother," he began, this time more gently. "Do not say another word. You are gravely mistaken in what you believe to have occurred. I brought Sarah here to _rest._ She was on the verge of exhaustion." He raised his gaze to his mother's, still angry, but at least not furious, Hoggle saw. "That is all. She only knew she was here when your 'visit' woke her up. So tell me now, what did you say to her, Mother?" 

She ignored the question. "Jareth, are you saying to me that you took the girl here without her knowledge?"

He clenched his jaw. "She was asleep; she could hardly give permission." As his mother opened her mouth to object, he burst out, "Does one ask a dying man permission to treat him? She was injuring herself, Mother!"

"But why not wait till she was awake?" The Queen studied her son's face. Her eyes narrowed. "You assumed she would resist you, did you not? Oh, Jareth, how could you be so impulsive? I'm sure the poor child had no idea where she was and she likely was quite frightened. This is why you are angry with me, she was angry with _you_, is that correct, Jareth?"

He looked away. "My relations with Sarah concern no one other than myself." Now Hoggle was very suspicious. While his vocabulary was not what he would call "high-falutin'," relations in his mind was the force that brought about the multiplication of those damned fairies. Alarmed, he watched the king even more intensely. _Lookin' away ain't like him…He always thinks he's too high and mighty to show or act like he's sorry about anything…_

Sure enough, the High Prince glanced back at his mother before fixing her with an insistent look. "And I am here now to determine what precisely you told her and what damage I must now undo." He folded his arms and regarded her expectantly.

She laughed shortly. "You are blaming me again, Jareth, for your own mistakes. It is a pity I did _not_ tell her how you have skulked around here since she left, how you been fairly glowing these past few days that you have seen one another again. It's a shame I didn't tell her that you have been in love with her since you first met her." Hoggle jumped as the Prince whipped away from his mother again, jaw line tight, stalking over to the window and…blinking rapidly? The dwarf rubbed his tired eyes—he had to be seeing things. He heard the Queen's lecture still going. "Perhaps then you wouldn't set yourself up for more disastrous mistakes. Oh, Jareth! I wish I had told her. You are far too proud for your own good. And too hot-headed," she added.

"Sarah has no need to be told anything," he retorted immediately. His eyes were cast down bitterly. "She is the one who refuses to explain herself." Hanging at his thighs, the Prince's hands fisted.

The Queen's eyes widened. At her feet, Hoggle gasped. "Did she—did you, that is—part on poor terms?"

"I have no idea," he snapped over his shoulder. "I had to send her back to find out what you two said that might have panicked her. Her mood is quite volatile. She regards me as one step from a monster again, for all I know." He glanced away again, pressing his mouth together in a tight line. "She is as cruel as ever."

"If she is so cruel, why not let her go?" the Queen asked coolly.

Hoggle glanced back at his lady in admiration as the Prince flared up under her goading. "Because for a damn second she had no idea this was real and she did not react to me with immediate hostility, and it was—it was—" He broke off and turned away. "I thought if I gave her time to think before she saw me again, she would remember—she would realize—she would _understand_—" His voice faltered briefly, then he burst out furiously, "If she would only quit being so damned stubborn—" 

His hand shot out and grabbed a vase; Hoggle feared for a moment the Prince would hurl it, but apparently he stopped himself in time. His mother had risen—the Queen put her hand against her son's back and for the first time in his life, Hoggle saw the Goblin King's shoulders slump. He eased his hand inch by inch back to the table, though his face was still dark with frustration and his eyes still shone strangely. When he spoke, it was in a low tone that Hoggle could barely make out. "Why do I hope, Mother…"

_He has to care 'bout her if he's carrying on like this_, Hoggle thought, watching the Goblin King. The Queen tilted her head against her son's back sympathetically and the dwarf looked away, feeling like an intruder. _Here he is, so worked up he don't even care that I'm here to see it._

"Yer Majesty," the dwarf heard himself speak up, to his own amazement. 

Both Fae shifted in surprise, perhaps having forgotten his presence. The Goblin King's head shot up from the table, eyes blazing. "What do _you _want—" he began to snarl, but to Hoggle's bewilderment, Jareth stopped and corrected himself in a far milder, if unenthusiastic, tone. "Hoggle, what is it?"

Both the Queen and the dwarf now regarded the High Prince in open amazement. That Jareth would ever get his name right, and without anybody correcting him first--that was unprecedented in Hoggle's memory. 

Crossing his arms, Jareth tapped a booted toe coolly, reminding the dwarf he was dealing still with the infamous impatience of the Goblin King. "What did you want to say, Hoggle?"

_A second time! _Hoggle blinked in astonishment. Well, that did it. If pity had not already moved him to speak, now he eagerly addressed the Prince. "Majesty, it's Sarah's Christmas."

"I am aware of that, thank you, Hoggle."

Jareth was, in the dwarf's estimation, a very smart man—_sharper than any fox I ever saw_, he thought to himself_—_but even the dwarf, in his limited relationship skills, could see the Goblin King sometimes missed the obvious. "Majesty, she has to spend all day with her _family_."

The Goblin King's eyes closed with an expression of infinite suffering at the hands of fools. "Yes, yes, that is typical for the mortal realm. Is that all?" 

His mother shot her son a warning glance as she seated herself again. "Listen to him, Jareth. He knows her very well."

Hoggle nodded vigorously and shook his yarn-wrapped hands in emphasis. "Majesty, if she's gots to be with her family, that means she's got to stay all day with that witch of a stepmother of hers." The dwarf could see realization dawn on the Prince's features. "Majesty, Sarah's always callin' me after she's got to visit with that rotten human. She gets real upset." He glanced over at the Queen for reassurance; she nodded at him supportively. "Times like that, she needs a friend, I think."

The Goblin King had bolted by the time Hoggle glanced back to his spot. The Queen laughed softly and drew another loop around Hoggle's wizened hands. "Impulsive as always, I fear." She looked at Hoggle again, her eyes sparkling. "I thank you on his behalf, Hoggle."

"I just hopes Sarah'll thank me," the dwarf muttered.

* * *


	8. Holidaze

_I am going to throw the mashed potatoes at her head any second now_.

Sarah bit a dark smile back as she fixed her gaze on her plate. 

"…and I've got a pie in the oven for all of us later—well, except Sarah, as she has to watch that figure of hers…"

Toby kicked her sympathetically under the table; she tapped him back with her foot. _I'm okay, I'm okay. It's not like I haven't heard this every other time I've come home. _

Now the aunts and uncles had redirected the conversation to her cousin Jennifer's wedding plans. Karen was gushing enthusiastically down at the end of the table, her voice not particularly loud but very, very clear.

"I'd so love to be planning a wedding—we'll have to wait a while, though, as Toby isn't out of high school," she laughed lightly, "and Sarah—well, you know Sarah." Her knife scraped the edge of the butter dish loudly as she buttered her roll. "Perhaps someday."

One of her cousins prodded her. "You didn't answer me. What classes are you taking now?" 

She mumbled a few names absently and pretended to listen as her cousins offered what they'd heard about her professors. She was just commenting on one of their textbooks when Karen's commentary again drifted down the table to her. She didn't want to listen, but she couldn't help it.

"Oh, no, she's not seeing anyone…I know, I had hoped, too…I'm not sure why the last one didn't work out…I always tell her to try a bit more to dress up but she persists in those jeans of hers, even though I've told her they're not the sort of thing to catch a man's eye…With a little work she'd have a decent figure…No, not even blind dates…"

She caught Toby's eye now. He threw a roll at their obnoxious cousin Jack. "Head's up!"

Various adult heads snapped to their end of the table as Jack emitted a word not generally associated with Christmas joy. Her father barked Toby's name in reprimand, while Karen slammed her wine glass down. "Sarah, can't you control your brother for five minutes?"

"Guess not," Toby piped up before Sarah could answer. "Head's up, Mom!" Another roll went flying towards the adults. 

_"Tobias Charles Williams—"_

Blessing her brother silently, Sarah ducked out of the room.

* * *

In our Hallmark minds, the word "holiday" conjures up certain instant images: a loving family gathered around a bountiful, candlelit table; a child reaching on tip-toe to hang an ornament while adoring parents and relatives watch on; a household bubbling over with joy, warmth, and music as Martha Stewart snowflakes float down past the windows. 

It is all, of course, a lie. For the majority of individuals, with the exceptions of modern-day saints and revoltingly happy people, a holiday at home means a profanity-laced commentary while stringing Christmas lights, quarrels over the location and difficulty of retrieving last year's decorations, lovingly referred to as "the Christmas crap," desperate and pathetic last-ditch attempts to find out what one's closest relatives actually like, exhausted breakdowns, drunken sobbing over bills, resentful cleaning, and finally, cranky and snappish run-ins on the "holiday" itself, which generally end with one person running from the room and snapping about how "normal families" manage to celebrate without trying to be nasty to one another. Add an already tense familial relationship to the mix and it was no wonder that Sarah had run up the stairs to her old bedroom, seeking a place to shed her angry tears in private. It was bad enough to hate holidays without ruining Toby's Christmas, too.

The room was dark and smelled somewhat stale as she entered, her hand finding the light switch automatically as she entered. It was still her room, although Sarah had not lived at home for several years now. While the room's familiar decorations gave her a comforting welcome, she couldn't say she'd want to return to this place, this frilly niche that reminded her of when she had honestly believed in wishes granted and ambitions achieved. 

Reflections on maturity, however, were not foremost on Sarah's mind as she flopped down on the bed, closing her eyes and trying to steady her breathing. _It's so stupid to let that bitch get to me_. She sighed; it was hard to curse Karen, even in her head. _Fine, then, it's idiotic to let that woman get to me. So she's not the world's worst stepmother, and she does care about me, but Jesus, could she be a little more insulting? Why doesn't she just say it instead of being so fake-nice about it? "Here, world, is Sarah and no man is ever going to want to touch her because she's pasty-white, has hips and a butt that is too big, and only does useless things like going to the library." Why doesn't she just say that instead of the usual bullshit. "Oh, Sarah dear, you are the only one of the cousins not to bring an escort—is your boyfriend busy? Oh, you have no boyfriend now? Oh, I see, that must be very difficult, although I suppose you do get used to it… Well, you should ask your cousin Jennifer what to do—when was it you and Andrew were engaged, Jennifer?" _

"Every freakin' holiday, she has to bring it up and make it really clear to everyone what a loser I am," she muttered to herself, beating her fists on the fluffy comforter pointlessly.

"You won the Labyrinth, and if I may be so bold, what is more important than that?" 

_Oh, no_. Sarah's eyes snapped open and she rolled over just in time to see Jareth settling himself on the edge of her bed. She shoved backwards in the bed in alarm, her back slamming painfully into her headboard. "Damn it!" She saw his gloved hand extending towards her, but she batted it away. "Don't touch me!" She bit her tongue. _God, I'm such a wuss; I can't even tell him to keep his paws off me without feeling guilty. _"I mean, I'm not hurt or anything." Now, with her bruised back bringing her back to reality, Sarah could look over at Jareth, at his unreadable face. He drew his hand back to his side with a graceful shrug, eyes not leaving her.

He was dressed all in black today, she saw, like when she had first seen him. He even had his black cloak on, elegantly spilling from his shoulders down to the floor. Now as then, he appeared too large for her ordinary home, too large and masculine for her absurd little bed as he leaned forward on it, watching her. _Like a cat about to pounce_.

She bit her lower lip and tried to draw her limbs closer without making her trepidation obvious. "Don't you have any respect for privacy?" 

"None," he smiled; the room seemed brighter, despite his menacing attire. "I want no secrets between us. It is much more…_intimate_…that way, don't you agree?"

She frowned and automatically her hand shot out for a pillow to throw at him. "Don't tell me you've come here to try to seduce me under my own parents' roof. That's just disgusting. And even if I were ever in the mood, I am so not in the mood now." 

She had the dizzying sensation of a shark victim before the jaws closed as Jareth's body seemed to pour forward, slinking towards her. His hands were on either side of her before she could roll from the bed; he advanced forward on his knees and she could only flatten herself beneath him in order to avoid his approach. Now he was above her, lifted away from her body by his hands and knees, and his cloak swept around her like a canopy's drape.

Normally, if Sarah had been placed in such a position by an old friend, a significant movement of her knee would have been enough to remind the person of the wisdom of backing off. With Jareth staring down at her like that, however, she had no thoughts of risking his anger. 

"You are such a curious creature, Sarah." She blinked and would have responded, but he merely cocked his head at her and continued, his eyes regarding her with the awe of an archaeologist touching ancient treasure. "Why do you let these people upset you so?"

It was impossible to deny she had been crying, because he had adjusted his weight on his palms and was now tracing with a thumb the path of a tear on her cheek. Sarah swallowed and met his eyes. _Note to self: Get head examined later for why your body goes nuts just looking him in the eye_. "I—I—please give me room, I can't breathe…" she finally managed to whisper.

Now he smiled in his familiar mocking manner. "What, are you afraid of me? I think not. What is it, love, do I make you uncomfortable? I would be most delighted to help you relax, you know…" With that, his body lowered an inch, as if about to descend against hers.

Before she could snarl at him for his outrageousness, he smiled and shifted backwards, off her body but not far away. She clawed her way upwards and back again, staring at a Goblin King sitting cross-legged just inches away from her.

"What the hell—"

"Why are you crying?"

Her mind repeated her earlier words for her. _What the hell--? _"Excuse me?"

His features were distant and serious once more, no light of mockery in the eyes that did not waver from her. He steepled his fingertips and regarded her above them. "You were and are distressed. You insulted yourself earlier, as if the champion of my Labyrinth deserved no better. Why?"

_He actually believes I'm just going to spill to him_. Sarah gaped at Jareth, alternate urges to sob on his shoulder—no one knows you better than your worst enemy, after all—and to tell him off for his arrogant belief he could command her confidence doing battle inside of her.

"What does she always 'bring up,' Sarah?" he asked, when she did not answer him. "Why did you say that to yourself before?"

She found her tongue at last. "I didn't say it to you—I was thinking aloud and it's no business of yours," she responded tartly.

His eyebrow arched. "Everything about you is my business."

"Excuse me? You are insane—"

He waved a glove airily. "You are excused. Now, answer my question if you will." He paused momentarily, as if debating something within, before continuing. "I wish to know whatever distresses you, Sarah." 

"Why?" she asked before she could stop herself.

Now the old devilry was back in his eye. "I fear I grow jealous when any others anger you. That position has been filled." 

She laughed despite herself. "What is _wrong_ with you?"

He turned his attention to his hand where a crystal appeared and spun, before dancing across his nimble fingertips. "I could kill her, you know."

"WHAT?"

His eyebrow lifted, he glanced over at her. "This woman who upsets you so. Say the word, and you may have whatever revenge you like. Death, madness, exile, the Bog—"—he glanced around the room, his eyebrows bent in disdain as he gestured to an aged _US Weekly_ on the floor—"a lifetime of untidy rooms and your popular culture, the revenge shall be yours to choose." The corner of his mouth curved slyly. The crystal slid off his palm like his glove might, falling gently into the comforter and rolling up alongside Sarah's legs to her fist. The crystal bumped her hand gently, like a puppy asking to be petted, but her hand remained closed to it. "Choose. It is a gift." 

"And if I choose to have a crazy Goblin King take up stalking her instead of me? Jareth, you have got to be kidding me! I don't want anything bad to happen to Karen!" She sighed; it was true. _I'm too wimpy to wish on her a lifetime of reading about Ben Affleck and J-Lo, for God's sake._

"Really." A thousand hours of practice could not achieve the amount of disbelief in that single word.

"Yes! Look, she's horrible, we manage to fight every time I'm over here, and she's always on my back about—about—anyway, I do not want _anything_ bad to happen to Karen and let me get this straight, I will _never_ forgive you if anything does." _Geez, points to me for actually speaking up for the dragon. _She felt an adrenaline rush at the realization she'd actually, in a way, defended the woman who drove her to homicidal urges on a weekly basis._ That alone has to earn my way in to heaven_. 

Then she saw the small smile flit briefly across Jareth's lips before he leaned over on his elbow in a nonchalant pose, lounging before her. "So we have established this much, that you are angry with this creature, but you do not wish to harm her. You even suspect you care for her, although she frustrates you. Most curious," he added, dryly. Sarah had the uncomfortable sense he meant something by that, but her mind refused to walk down that path. "And yet you have not told me why she angers you."

"Why do you want to know, anyway?" She moved a pillow over her legs, feeling odd to be sitting before him as his black-clad form lay sprawled across the bed, like a sleeping panther at her feet.

"Boredom, clearly," he drawled carelessly. "But do go on." 

"You're such an ass," she hissed before she could stop herself.

"You clearly appreciated it. Feel free to indulge again, by the way." He smirked.

"God, why are you here?!" She was so frustrated she could almost cry.

"I'll give you a hint." She felt leather wrap around her ankle before she slid downwards on the bed. His face appeared above her; he'd drawn her down to lie next to him, and the feel of his left hand positioned casually by her hip let her know he meant her to stay there. "I'm not your fairy godmother."

"You are unbelievable!"

"So I've been told." His pointed teeth flashed at her as he smiled. "But for other reasons." He let his eyes slide over her pointedly before returning to meet her angry gaze. "Really, Sarah, you should feel honored. There are millions of women who have called for me to visit them, but I have almost never indulged them. Their calls, that is." She didn't want to know what that wicked twist of his mouth meant. "And now you have received my attention, even though you have not even called for me. Yet. You must be saving my name for a _very_ special occasion." She glared. "But as I was saying, you ought to be grateful for the honor of my presence here. Some might say this is a boon from heaven for you, Sarah."

"A boon from heaven for you, you mean, that I haven't kicked your—"

He clucked his tongue indulgently. "Tsk-tsk, temper, Sarah. Now, do restrain your passionate little self, or I fear I shall not be able to restrain myself." For once, she heeded one of Jareth's warnings and went still. "That's better. Now, where were we? Ahh, yes, having a friendly chat about a little problem of yours, this creature who has made my Sarah cry."

_His Sarah, my ass_. She flinched_. Oh, I guess that was bad wording, but whatever. He's a bastard and he lives to tease me. _She glared at him; he continued to smile softly at her. Gloved fingers now grazed her cheek. "Trust me, Sarah," she heard him whisper. "I would ease your heart, if I could." 

"She's just always nasty to me," she muttered against her will, leaning into the comforting palm. 

"Vile woman. What does she do?"

She paused, but a gloved thumb crossing her lip reminded her that she unfortunately had his closest attention. "She makes it a point to humiliate me, okay?" Sarah closed her eyes, bit her lip, and whispered beneath her breath reluctantly, "You of all people should know about that."

"True," he murmured in an amused tone. "But I don't set you up for it."

Her eyes and mouth flew open in outrage and he laughed outright. "Now, now, Sarah, let us not try me. Do go on with what you were saying." He leaned further over her, close enough that she could see that the symbol from his pendant was stamped on the shoulder-clasp of his cloak. Strangely, rather than intimidating her, his nearness was comforting, soothing. "How does she attempt to humiliate you?"

"She's always being critical of me in public, okay? I'm a graduate student—that means I'm training to teach at a college--and she acts like that's nothing. She actually told someone I'm still trying to figure out what to do with my life, instead of saying I'm in grad school."

He tilted his head. "That is very disrespectful."

She looked at him suspiciously. "Don't patronize me."

"I'm not." He lowered his voice confidentially. "This may come as a shock…but there are those in my family who would say I am not perfect, either. And remind me on a regular, most unpleasant basis."

"Oh, come on! I've met your mother and you can't tell me she doesn't think you walk on water."

The bed vibrated with his chuckle. "Not quite, I fear."

She glanced down as a thought occurred to her. "So…um…by the way, did she ever talk about, um, running into me?"

His fingertip guided her face back towards him. "I spoke with her and made sure there was no misunderstanding, never fear."

"Well, at least she doesn't hate me for being a tramp, then." Her mouth twisted wryly.

"Hate you?" There went the eyebrow. "Quite the contrary, I assure you."

"Yeah, right. Karen had a fit when Toby went to a junior-high dance with a girl who wasn't country-club material, for God's sake. Let's compare: I'm a human, I don't have one-thousandth of your money, I have no title, all the women who were at that ball were prettier, I'm completely boring and dull, I said no to you, and she's already found me in your bed," she ticked off on her fingers. "No, I don't think that would really score points with any mother."

He laughed softly again, golden hair flying as he shook his head. "She thinks you are perfectly charming, I promise you."

"She met me for all of five minutes, give me a break!"

His tone was amused. "She is quite decided in her opinions, like certain other women I know." Sarah snorted and he drew a lock of her hair out between his fingers, turning it to catch the light. "And it takes very little time to recognize that a woman is beyond exquisite."

Her heart rate surged forward like a Thoroughbred erupting from the starting gate, her mouth opening into a silent "O." He lifted a teasing brow at her, lightening the moment. "For once, Sarah Williams is speechless? The world must be ending!"

"Oh, stop." She swatted him, blushing a little and swallowing roughly. She cast about for a topic that would reduce the chances of him saying something again devastatingly sweet, which would cause her to grab him by the hair and pull him down on her for a kiss that would end at least a morning from now. 

He was continuing to toy with her hair, apparently waiting for her to guide the conversation. She poked him to bring his attention back to her. "So who is the hypercritical relative? Or are you making this up?"

He shook a finger before her. "Now, now, let's not be distracted with my relatives when we have yours to discuss." She thrust her lip out in a faux-pout before she could reprimand herself for playing with the enemy. He chuckled again. "Later, I promise, you may ask me later. My point was, I have had similar experiences with excessively unpleasant relations and I sympathize with your travails."

"Torture, maybe." Sarah rolled her eyes at the thought of Karen's comments earlier.

"You said she was very critical of you and your chosen task," he murmured. "You find this upsetting."

"Yes! It's like she has no respect for me whatsoever. She acts like I am deliberately trying not to go into the job market. Not that she really gives a damn about whether I've got a job or not," she grumbled.

_Oh, great!_ She stiffened and saw Jareth lower his head slightly closer, the thoughtful eyes now intense and insistent. His question was as expected: "And what does she give a damn about, Sarah?"

_Crap. _She'd trapped herself, walked right into what she'd successfully ducked till now. And she knew better than to expect a drop of sympathy from the Goblin King, either, even if he had been incredibly sweet tonight.

She made herself look him in the eye. Jareth was a slender man, his build closer to a dancer than a football player, but right now he felt as if he weighed more than a team of football players as Sarah pushed in vain against his chest. "I'm not leaving, love. Talk to me. I will not have you distressed."

_Is he actually concerned about me? _"But _you_ are distressing me!"

There was the shark's smile again. "Exciting you, don't you mean?"

"Oh, go away!"

"Not yet." His amused expression shifted to seriousness. "Now, what does she criticize you about that you do not wish to discuss with me?" His eyes narrowed. "Sarah, I wouldn't be inclined to agree with her, would I? Are you doing anything to harm yourself?" he demanded.

"No!" she exclaimed indignantly. He looked skeptical. "I said no, since when do you believe Karen over me?"

"I can't believe you until I have another reason that explains your reluctance to discuss this," he responded.

_Damn him!_ She sighed; behind the random teasing, he did appear genuinely worried for her. _I'm so pathetic; he asks and I have to answer. _She set her jaw deliberately, digging her nails into the fabric of the bed. "Fine, she's always making comments in public about my love life." She saw the sudden, dangerous darkness in his eyes and blurted out, "or lack thereof." His body relaxed. "She has a job of her own, and she didn't get married until she was in her thirties, but she apparently thinks every woman should be married by the time she's twenty-four and nothing else is important compared to that. Now are you happy?"

"No." She looked away from his eyes; although her body had melted companionably next to his, she still had an unnerving sensation of being undressed before him when their eyes met. "She finds fault with you because you have no husband?"

"Yes, and she takes every chance she can get to say it, okay?" Actually, Karen's goal was more a man in Sarah's life than specifically a husband, but she couldn't say that to Jareth. She already was bracing for him to volunteer to walk her to the altar; she could only imagine his smug look if she told him Karen was waiting with baited breath for the day she brought a man home, period. "And always in front of everyone. She makes me sound like I'm defective or something." His brow furrowed and his mouth opened as if to comment. _Probably to say he'd like to check me out or whatever_. She hurried on, defiantly. "And before you can say anything, because I _know_ what you're going to say, I believe a woman can be happy and just fine without a guy. There's more to life than living to get married."

His eyebrow went up. "Who said I believed otherwise?"

Surprise knocked the moral outrage out of her. "You don't?"

He chuckled. "Of course not. I hardly admire dependency. It is merely an excuse for irresponsibility." His look was pointed. "As I recall, I have been firm in the past about taking responsibility for one's actions. No quarter to man or woman. " 

"Oh, I guess." She frowned. Well, it was true, even if there was something completely wrong about a man who admittedly wanted only to get her on her back now advocating women's lib. "It's just a little surprising, all things considered."

He ignored the sarcasm. "I dislike dependency, not companionship. The latter…has much sweeter rewards," he mused, his thumb drawing a circle on her hip. He flicked his gaze back up to her face. "Particularly when my companion is a remarkably intelligent, generous, and fearless woman. Forget this creature, Sarah; she is but a fool who does not see what a rare soul you are." 

_What is he on tonight? _If he complimented her in the past, it was always expressed as part of a joke. Now he was loading her down with flattering words, and if she didn't keep a straight head on her shoulders, she'd end up believing he actually liked her, rather than just wanting to sleep with her. She attempted to still his fingers and ended up pressing them against her side. _Great_. Not, she thought with a pang, that she particularly wanted to move away from them just then. "Um, thanks for the thoughts." _I can't believe I'm enjoying this._ _But who wouldn't enjoy grousing to someone who makes it clear he's completely on your side? _Her face burned and she stared at the bedding again, avoiding his eyes. "So you got your answer. Will you let me go now?" 

"Never." He smiled sweetly. "But I think I shall indulge your irrational mulishness about sharing your thoughts with me and change the subject temporarily, to something less upsetting for you." He paused and seemed to stare at the distance beyond her before his gaze flickered down to her again. _Oh, no_. She knew that teasing glint well. "Sarah, I am curious about something…Not to embarrass you, of course, but I've noticed something about your little chambers here…"

She glanced around frantically. What was he talking about? _Oh, God, I didn't leave any of the New Kids on the Block crap out, did I? _

She knew him well enough to know any answer would get her in trouble. His smile turned positively evil. "Why, oh why, my dear, do you have a doll of me?" 

_Oh, shit! _She glanced over at her table and wanted to die. Her face reddened so thoroughly that she nearly started sweating. She had forgotten that stupid thing. She had taken few of her childhood items with her to her apartment, the book and the music box being the only representatives of "that time" in her new home. While she couldn't bring herself to throw away the doll in her final cleaning of her childhood bedroom, she couldn't bring herself to take the doll with her, either. 

"Not that I object to you having a representative of me in your bedroom," he was continuing. "But I do think your bed now needs its own life-sized Goblin King." He smirked. 

"Let me guess, wardrobe sold separately?" She rolled her eyes. "Who said the doll was you, anyway? It's just a coincidence that he's a blond."

The eyebrow of the real Goblin King arched in imitation of the doll on her table. "Really. The magnificent hair, the eyes I've heard are quite unforgettable, the Adonis-like features—"—Sarah snorted in protest—"—the exquisite fashion taste, even an elegant crystal in his palm? The resemblance is quite striking, wouldn't you say? The only thing missing is—well, I fear I must apologize to your little lady dolls, as it would seem he's lacking a certain something…"

"JARETH!" 

"Well, he _is_, and I must say it's quite a change and not particularly good for my reputation, you know. _That_ could be construed as character assassination. Wouldn't you agree?" Sarah felt as though she was going to explode—she didn't know if she'd burst out laughing or throttle him first. "Really, given your insatiable curiosity, I am rather surprised you have been satisfied with examining that little fellow—not much more to that king than what meets the eye, I'm afraid. Do feel free to call me when you want to peek at the _enhanced_ version…"

"JARETH!" She clapped her hands over her flushed face and dissolved into helpless, embarrassed laughter; the mattress rocked slightly as he joined her, chuckling, touching his forehead to hers.

"Jareth?" A horribly familiar female voice interjected. 

Sarah was a survivor in life because, when crisis occurred, crises like parental figures walking in on extremely compromising scenes, she could take stock of a situation rapidly.

Fact: She was lying on her bed, her face still red and her breath still coming too quickly thanks to the twin feelings of embarrassment and anger that Jareth always elicited from her.

Fact: Her body was positioned quite snugly alongside a male's; he was leaning over her, his hand quite familiarly set on her hip.

Fact: The male above her was hardly an ordinary, slightly dorky schoolmate, or your average normal guy, but a connoisseur of capes, obscenely tight breeches, and permanent gloves. His clothing was just as odd as Michael Jackson's, although for every ounce of revulsion one felt toward the King of Pop, one felt attraction for the Goblin King.

Fact: Not only was she lying on her bed beneath a bizarrely dressed incarnation of sex, one of her family members had just walked in on them.

Karen.

* * * 

"May I ask what is going on here?"

As Karen's icy question hovered over the room, Sarah rapidly pushed Jareth aside—he shifted over with a grunt of protest, as if he'd actually intended to maintain his position on top of her—and behind her as she rose from the bed, praying she could keep Karen's attention on her and not on the man on her bed. 

_I studied drama, damn it. I can do this_. She flashed a fake smile at Karen, as if it were perfectly normal to be caught with a man on her bed. "Oh, nothing, nothing at all, he's just an old friend dropping by for a visit…"

Karen looked doubtfully at her before glancing back to the bed and the figure there. _Figures she'd be more interested in checking out the goods than trying to figure out what I'm thinking_. Sarah frowned. One couldn't say Karen hadn't been looking surprised before, but somehow her eyes nearly bulged out of her head as she inspected Sarah's guest. "And this—I'm sorry, I don't recall hearing the doorbell, I didn't know Sarah was entertaining a guest…"

Now Sarah felt like a cartoon herself as her jaw slackened in shock. _Karen, apologize? Karen, bother to be polite when she could have much more fun embarrassing me? When she could make a crack about the miraculous nature of me having a guy around at all? _She shot a look over her shoulder to warn Jareth to stay quiet, so she could provide their cover. "He just got here. This is—this is…Ohhhhhhh…"

Her voice trailed off as she did a rapid double-take at the bed. There was a golden-haired figure in black on it, yes, who was now rising to the bed and walking with a slight swagger to her. An astonishingly handsome figure, yes. But in the space of a heartbeat, Jareth had managed to transform into a convincing facsimile of a human, if an unspeakably gorgeous one. His hair was still an art form of spiked carelessness, but much shorter and more subtle. The gloves were gone, and Sarah had to force herself not to stare at his white hands. But the outfit was the most stunning change of all. He was wearing his boots still, but under tight-fitting black jeans that flared at the cuffs and above, shamelessly flaunted his better assets. On top—well, of all the men in the universe he would, of course, be the first to understand that, next to a tuxedo, nothing suited the male body better than a cableknit turtleneck sweater.

His eyes sparkled in amusement at her reaction as he simultaneously tapped her mouth to close and faced Karen. Fortunately for them both, Karen was too busy gawking at him herself to notice Sarah's suddenly stunned expression. Something stirred, snake-like, within her at Karen's hungry examination—an odd urge to drag Jareth away from Karen rose forcefully inside her, and she had her hand on Jareth's forearm before she could think.

He flicked an amused glance at her before returning his attention to her slack-jawed stepmother. "My name is Jareth, and I believe you are Mrs. Williams? No apologies are necessary—I was terribly rude not to pay my respects to the lady of the house first, but you understand, I could not wait to see Sarah. In fact, to be truthful, she wasn't expecting my visit."

He had the nerve, the unspeakable nerve, to drape his arm around her shoulders and pull her affectionately against him. She slid her left arm behind his back and pinched his side ineffectually, which only made her glare at him harder. _Jerk. _ Of course there wouldn't be an inch to pinch on the likes of Mr. Perfect. 

"Ahhh, I see." From Karen's face, it was clear she did not, but was attempting to lie courteously nonetheless. She fixed an accusatory gaze on her stepdaughter. "That would explain why Sarah hadn't told me about you—about your visit, that is."

He unleashed his smile on her and Karen briefly resembled one of the teenage girls shrieking at the Beatles in their Ed Sullivan show performance. Sarah gritted her teeth. "And Sarah didn't tell me what a strikingly beautiful stepmother she had." He offered his hand to her; taking the hand she extended, he bent over it slowly, searching the lines with his eyes while his fingers stroked deliberately over the skin. "I must say—your hands are so—forgive me, I must use this word—sensual…"

Sarah almost joined her stepmother in turning red, but for different reasons. _What the hell is he up to? _She wanted to belt Jareth and then slap Karen for being a stupid, egotistical witch. _As if he's serious_. A sickening doubt spread through her stomach as she watched as Jareth's simmering eyes roved over Karen's body slowly, his fingers still moving over her hand. _He couldn't be—could he? Why else would he be carrying on like this? _He finally turned Karen's hand—_bitch_—and leaning over, his eyes not leaving hers, touched his lips to her knuckles. "I am…enchanted…to make your acquaintance…"

Karen giggled. _Giggled? He's laying it on with a bulldozer and she's falling for this shit?_ She nearly bit her lip off in her effort to keep from speaking her thoughts aloud. 

"I am so glad you've come by," Karen was cooing, and babbling some garbage about joining them for dessert downstairs.

"I think I've already had mine," he responded without jest, eyes tracing her silhouette appreciatively. Sarah's stomach lurched. _He means this? He's seriously coming on to Karen right in front of me? That mo—_but his voice interrupted in her internal diatribe."But may I come another time? It is…such a pleasure…to meet a woman such as yourself…and I would certainly…savor…the opportunity to become…better acquainted."

"Any time…" Karen attempted to purr, but ended up gushing. _Jesus, she's nearly having an orgasm just looking at him. Bitch. Bastard. _Sarah tasted blood on her lip. _I hate them both, I hate them both, they deserve one another_…She briefly considered slamming her foot on Jareth's; that would end the discomforting eye-sex going on in front of her, then. _Disgusting!_

Karen must have felt mildly uncomfortable, at least, because after another cooed invitation to join them for pie—"and whipped cream," offered with a come-hither look that made Sarah want to scream—she finally pulled her hand from Jareth's and ducked out of the room to return downstairs. _Or maybe to hell, where she belongs_, Sarah thought viciously, jerking away from Jareth and blinking rapidly as she took a seat her vanity.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him stretching; a pale moon-shaped sliver of well-cut abdomen appeared as he raised his arms over his head, much to her distress. He paused with his arms above him for a second too long, as if waiting for her admiration. _God damn him for being such a smug asshole_. As he lowered his arms, his clothing and hair transformed back to his more traditional Goblin King look. "I gather you liked the little disguise. Well done, no?"

She remained silent. _I am not going to stroke his gigantic ego, no matter what he does or says_. _Asshole_. He strolled up behind her, gloved hands alighting on her shoulders and sliding gently inward, to knead the inner muscles of her neck.

She jerked away. "Keep your damn hands off me!"

"Sarah?" _He actually sounds surprised. Asshole_. 

"Just go away! I didn't want you here to begin with, and I don't want you here now!" She searched the room for a place to go that wouldn't allow his proximity. Sitting on the bed left her open on all sides. The floor? He could easily pin her there. And obviously, her vanity wasn't safe. 

He stood between her and the door, arms folded. "You are in quite a temper, love…Do explain."

"Just get out! I'm tired of this!" 

He raised an eyebrow. "This?"

"Your man-whoring act! You pull this game on every woman, don't you? God, could you be more disgusting? Figures you'd be all over Karen—you both thrive on making my life hell!" She stomped over to the table, brushed the doll off it, and sat there with defensively folded arms, glaring at the old Escher room poster. _Wish I was there now, he deserves to have his damn world smashed in…._

"From the look you gave me earlier, I rather doubt I was repulsive to you," he responded coolly, walking after her. She tensed but refused to look at him. "What has brought on this sudden change of mood?"

She still didn't answer him and his arms were suddenly braced on either side of her legs, his face lowered to hers. She saw a stirring anger there, before she looked away deliberately. "Sarah, you are being childish. If you expect me to tolerate that, think again." A vision of her first encounter with Jareth, with him ordering her to take on the Labyrinth in order to win Toby back, drifted through her mind. "Tell me what is going on in that head of yours before I am forced to invade your privacy far more than you might prefer. As I told you earlier, I will endure no secrets between us, Sarah."

"Why don't you go invade Karen's privacy? Borrow her freakin' whipped cream and have your damn fun?" she lashed back at him. 

"I beg your pardon?"

"You should! You should! And I wouldn't forgive you, either!" God, her voice just cracked. _Am I pathetic or what? _

"What in the name of the gods is the matter with you, woman?" he exclaimed in frustration. Jareth attempted to catch her chin with his fingers, but she jerked away. She was too angry to be frightened by the glare he leveled on her.

"You, you are the matter! You come here and harass me, force me to talk about things that are none of your business, for a moment I believed you actually—" she choked back the words, not wanting to give him more reason to feel superior. "You don't have the decency to spare me the humiliation of my stepmother walking in on us, and then you have the _gall_ to all but screw my stepmother right in front of me! Well, sorry I have hips and Karen doesn't, but that still doesn't give you the right to be such a royal jackass! So why don't you just go, get out?"

She shoved backwards on the table, intending to go beyond his reach and hop off, but his hands arrested her movement. They were like iron clamps, almost painful. She still refused to meet his eyes, but she could feel them boring in on her as his golden hair brushed against her averted face. "I cannot fathom you, woman. You know I would never willingly expose you to embarrassment before another," he hissed. "I was distracted when the woman entered and I had few options to deal with the matter that you would find acceptable."

"Oh, yeah, distracted! As in, licking your lips when you were checking her out, you mean?"

"What in the name of the Underground--? Sarah, I was trying to get the woman's hand without alerting her suspicion, so I could put a memory spell on her. She won't remember any of this or give you grief over it. Now, are you telling me you were _jealous_?" He brought his face swiftly down towards hers, trying to read her eyes, but as they were filled with angry tears she couldn't see much of his expression.

"You would think that, you conceited ass!" Her pride was stinging like a physical wound; she wanted to cry, she wanted to throw something, she wanted to throw up. On him. Getting away from him was the priority, and so she did the only thing she could think to do. She drew up her leg to half-shove, half-kick him back slightly. Then, in a matter of seconds, she took advantage of his momentary distraction to jerk her right arm free, before she hauled back and slapped him.

Even as her hand made stinging contact with his skin, she knew it was a mistake. Tears spilling over her eyes, she fled. He was still as a statue as she rolled back, threw her body off the table, and ran for the door. When he finally turned his head to her, his eyes slitting openly slowly, like a rattler, there was no smile on his face, no wicked glint in his eye. She blurted out before he could utter the threat in his eyes. "Just get the hell away from me! Leave me alone for once, won't you?" 

His lips were a straight line of rage as she flew from the room, slamming the door. "Perhaps I will, Sarah," he said with slow-building fury, then spun, his black cloak flying out behind him, towards the window and his exit.

* * *


	9. Midnight Toasting

Somewhere in the Queen's Castle, a door slammed so powerfully that the very floor of the Queen's chambers seemed to rattle.

Hoggle jumped back from the window as, minutes later, Her Majesty herself stalked into the room, doors flying open before her in imitation of her son's typical angry entrances. 

She nodded briefly to him. "I do not know precisely what happened, Hoggle, but it must be as we feared." Another enormous crash shook the floor as though a dragon had landed nearby; distantly, Hoggle heard glass being smashed. "He is leaving for the Goblin Castle for the time being and will not see me." 

Hoggle buried his face in his gnarled hands and wailed, "He's gonna kill me!"

The Queen compressed her lips and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Courage, Hoggle. You are to stay with me for the moment." She hesitated. "He told my steward it would be best for your…for your safety now, my dear," she admitted shakily. 

Hoggle wept outright, and the Queen drew him closer to her skirt. "Fear not, my dear. My son is…simply very upset." Her voice shook somewhat as the floor beneath them trembled in seeming fear of the Goblin King's rage.

The dwarf could not spare the energy to remind her that when the High Prince was "very upset," various creatures ended up in the Bog and far worse. "What'll we do now?" he whimpered into her skirt, sniffling.

The Queen glanced out of the window thoughtfully; a white horse was flying at a hard gallop out of the courtyard. "We wait, Hoggle, we wait. He will compose himself shortly and then, then we shall find out what is going on." 

The dwarf peeked up from her skirts. It would be a bad idea, he knew, to suggest Jareth could have hurt Sarah, but he didn't like not knowing if she was all right or not. "Maybe I could visits Sarah and see?"

She shook her head minimally. "I fear her state must be no better than his at the moment, Hoggle. We would do better to give the girl time." 

"And then?"

She set her jaw grimly. "We shall see, Hoggle, we shall see." 

* * *

For several days now, Sarah had been in a peculiar state of denied fury. It wasn't as though she could tell her friends at school, or anybody else for that matter, what had gone on with Jareth. She didn't even want to summon Hoggle and cry on his shoulder, because she had a feeling he'd have some stories of Jareth that she was in no mood to hear, stories which would just make her feel guilty and make her more aware of the horrible voice inside that said she might have overreacted, even though Jareth was a damned pig, and she the one hurt by his jackassness.

So she walked around her apartment, slamming doors, stuffing garbage violently into bags as she cleaned, throwing her balding Christmas tree into the garbage bin of the apartment complex and wishing it were certain Goblin Kings, ripping down Christmas lights and décor.

It wasn't her best week, one could say.

And it culminated, as all dark post-holiday moods do, on New Year's.

* * * 

There is a general vision of New Year's Eve as a time of widespread gaiety and good-will, a global festival in the spirit of the eve of the Millennium, when one could briefly believe in goodwill, good beer, and good parties for all, symbolized in a single utopian belief, that Dick Clark's presence is enough to guarantee a "rocking" good time.

If you are depressed or unhappy at all, though, there are two options for New Year's activities. You can take the Retreat option—staying home, sulking by the TV and muttering aloud that it's just a stupid arbitrary pointless moment of time, anyway, and usually eating all that remains of your Christmas cookies and fudge—or you can choose the Attack option. You can, as Sarah did, force yourself to go to a New Year's Eve party even if you haven't the slightest desire to see another member of humanity, let alone join in revelry with them. And you can, as Sarah did, confront the situation with another strategic maneuver:

You can get very, very, very drunk.

* * *

"Guys suck," she was saying blearily. It was five to midnight and she was on her fourth…fifth…sixth, maybe?…glass of champagne. Or was it white wine? At this point, she didn't care. After she'd had the first couple of beers, she didn't care what she drank after that, just so long as she kept drinking.

At least there was a lot of alcohol, she thought to herself. Graduate students, not known for having the best social skills, generally supplied stocks of liquor in lieu of actual socialization at their parties. Ben's fridge was no different than any of her peer's refrigerators; it had enough alcohol in it to make illegal the blood alcohol limits of her entire department.

So now that the night was ebbing down in anticipation of the New Year (and the next wave of drinking, complete with the obligatory group surprise that some members of the party would be incapable of driving themselves home), Sarah had stumbled out to the deck for a little cold air and a philosophical study of the stars.

Well, as much as you could make a philosophical study of anything when the world was in double-focus.

"Guys suck," she repeated, and tried to remember why she'd said it to begin with.

"Women suck," said Allan, leaning on the deck's railing beside her. He gestured to the fallen beer can below him and nearly fell before righting himself. "Look at that. I wouldn't've dropped that good beer if it weren't for her."

_Her? Who is she again? Oh, yeah, Meredith ditched him a year ago._ "And I wouldn't be having a hard time getting drunk if it weren't for him," she retorted, bursting into snuffling sobs.

Allan's hand thudded a bit too heavily on her back in generic compassion. "They'll get theirs some day, all of 'em."

She had no idea who "they" were and she didn't care, but she nodded vaguely and grabbed an abandoned half-full beer can. "They don't deserve us, none of 'em ."

"Hey, that's mine," Allan protested, squinting at the can. "I think."

"I thought that was yours," she answered, pointing down at the fallen can.

"Oh, yeah, right." He hung his head solemnly before looking over at her again. "You're a smart girl, Sarah, whoever the bastard was didn't deserve you."

"Yeah," she agreed. It was great to be totally smashed and have no hesitation for once in admitting her good qualities. "I'm cool."

"You…._rock_," Allan said in a burst of affectionate enthusiasm. "You're so much better than that bitch Meredith. You even knew I dropped my beer."

"Yeah…That takes attention to—attention to—detail!" she finished triumphantly. In her general feeling of goodwill, she attempted to toast Allan and sloshed beer on her wrist. "Arrgh, I hate that."

"'s okay. That just means it was a good beer, I always say," Allan offered in comfort.

She studied the folk brilliance that was Allan beneath the December stars. To be truthful, all she could see at the moment was that his face was pasty-white, a sickly white as compared to the porcelain quality of the Goblin King's skin…of the sculpted face of…"Jaaaareeethhh…" she sighed.

"Whaaa?"

"Nothin', just clearin' my throat," she muttered, scuffing her toe against the deck. Behind them, she could hear the party noise rising; they were chanting something. Oh, yeah, the countdown to midnight. New Year's. A new freakin' year. _And I've got nobody to kiss, AGAIN_. _Jesus, the humiliation. _It didn't matter to Sarah that in the current state of her peers, nobody would remember who was there, let alone who was kissed or not. It was just emblematic of her life…her whole life…alone…No dud of a guy, let alone a sexy Goblin King…She remembered her very first teenage fantasy about him, after she heard "Sex Bomb" on the radio and how, in a burst of hormonal truth, she suddenly understood that it wasn't just a really, really bad song…Such a man did exist…God, she'd felt so guilty afterwards, but God, even at sixteen, just thinking about him…He was so freakin' beautiful. She gulped down the beer, cast it aside, and tossed down the remains of her wine/champagne/or whatever the hell it was. She hummed "Sex Bomb" forlornly to herself, swaying a little, as she imagined him. He was so yummy. She hiccupped a giggle, wondering what he'd say to that. Almost sweet, too, in the roundabout sort of way of those guys who would deny it and be outraged if you accused them of it. Which only made them more adorable. And funny, he was so funny. Much funnier than all the other male dumbasses. And damn, the man knew how to kiss. She scowled. Why was she doing this to herself? He was an arrogant ass, a prick who used women because they couldn't resist how unbelievably hot he was, and he didn't give a shit about her. She should be glad to be away from him, not sitting around lusting wildly at the thought of him. She should be revolted by his memory, not turned on by it. She accepted another glass of something from some vague blurry passer-by and sucked it down in seconds. But God, he was a man. And not just a funny man. A man with the best, most gloriously sculpted thighs on the planet—and Underground—and besides those magnificent thighs, a huge—and Sarah wailed for her loss.

"Hey, hey, let the stupid shit go," a guy was saying wisely to her, his hand groping her back in unsteady sympathy. _Being a nice girl still won't get you any on New Year's. _She sniffled in misery and rubbed hot tears from her cheeks, before a rippling motion caught her eye. _Allan_. Hey, there was Allan! She could kiss Allan! Yeah, that would show them. Hell, screw Jareth and his drooling on the ice-bitch Karen, she could screw Allan! Somewhere deep in her brain, a little voice raised its hand in protest at the logic behind this conclusion, but her drunken brain was too exhilarated at the idea of revenge to allow the protest to be considered. 

She glanced at him slyly. He seemed to be glancing back at her in the same manner, unless he wasn't just squinting because of all the beer. _ He's going to have some hangover_, she thought smugly, ignoring the line of beers and glasses next to her arm. 

There was a roar behind them and various numbers were being chanted. Oh, yeah, the countdown was wrapping up.

The countdown. If she meant to freakin' seduce him, she had to hurry! And be smooth about it—her revenge against the world would be no good if she only ended up looking desperate!

"You look good," he was saying.

"Yeah, you too. Gonna kiss me?"

"Yeah, all night long," he slurred, and although seduction was part of her diabolical plan, some part of Sarah still winced in repulsion at the very lame line.

"_TEN…NINE…EIGHT…"_

She put down/dropped her drink and lurched towards Allan. He stepped on her foot, laughed, and drew her closer. Both scrutinized each other's features carefully, being vaguely aware that in their state of mind they were as likely to hit each other's eyelids as lips.

"_SEVEN…SIX…FIVE…"_

"Five seconds to heaven, baby," Allan was saying. _Ugh. _Why was her revenge suddenly not looking as good as before? And why hadn't she remembered overdosing on alcohol could lead to some very bad breath?

"_FOUR…THREE…TWO…" _

She clenched her jaw, squished her eyes shut, and shoved her face forward hastily…

Before there was a shooting pain, a noise, a familiar voice, and then a familiar figure appeared in her blurred view…And then the philosophical December stars seemed to waver and fall to blackness above her…

* * *

If someone in the house of one Ben Petro, graduate student, had glanced out of the window on the stroke of midnight, he or she would have caught sight of a most interesting tableaux, which would surely be explained later by the evils of alcohol.

But fortunately for those in the backyard, at the stroke of midnight on New Year's the partiers inside were too preoccupied with midnight kisses and toasting to look to the back.

So they didn't see the tall woman tossing something from her hand as she stood over the fallen body of a male graduate student.

Nor did they see a giant, furry creature holding up a dwarf above a female graduate student, and the dwarf being gently lowered to the ground with one hand as the beast caught the falling girl with the other.

And they didn't hear the beast's moaned words, either. 

"Sawah…fall…"

* * *

"Shush, Ludo," the Queen hissed. "We can't be too loud."

Ludo nodded slowly, rocking the lifeless body in his arms.

The dwarf jumped up and down next to Ludo's side until the beast understood enough to tilt her downwards for his inspection. 

"You're sure she's well?"

"Sure, Majesty," Hoggle said, touching Sarah's scalp gingerly and frowning. He tossed the broken flower-pot away. That was the way it was done, the Queen had told him, but still…Well, that was why he had insisted that he, not Ludo, be the one to knock Sarah out. Otherwise, Sarah might be the broken one, not just the pot.

"Good, Jareth would never forgive me otherwise." 

"He ain't gonna forgive us anyway," muttered Hoggle, staring down at Sarah's white face. The dwarf was still an outcast from the Goblin Court. "I thinks he'll—"

"Your choice," the Queen interrupted sharply, "is to endure my son's misery or assist me. Don't second-guess me now, Hoggle." 

He nodded sadly and indicated to Ludo that the beast could straighten up. It couldn't be worse, he guessed. He was dreading the day he got the summons to go back to the Goblin Castle; from the reports of it, Jareth's temper had never been worse and the Bog would be the kindest thing he'd do to Hoggle. 

"You know it had to be done," the Queen hissed into the night air, casting the rest of her own shattered pot into the grass. "We were not a moment too soon. I will not sit by while some fool takes advantage of my daughter-in-law. The cad is lucky he shall have a headache and not the Bog for this." 

Hoggle considered mentioning Sarah was hardly even friends with Jareth, let alone his wife, but kept his mouth wisely shut. The Queen was in a mood just as bad as Jareth's could be, he thought and peered carefully at her feet—did she just kick the fallen boy? 

She caught the dwarf's eye and glared. "I will not have the mother of my grandchildren taken advantage of while my son is not present to defend her."

Hoggle frowned—technically, the Queen had bribed half the Goblin Castle and a few of Jareth's childhood friends to drag him out for a day of riding, so it wasn't as if Jareth's back had been turned on Sarah willingly. Hoggle knew Jareth was sharp enough to have read up on mortal holidays and he probably would've been watching Sarah on this one, even if they were sore at one another, the dwarf thought to himself. But the Queen had arranged for Jareth's distraction and she had worked her own magic to temporarily break the spell that allowed Jareth instant knowledge if any harm befell Sarah. Not that having a visit from Her Majesty was exactly harm, of course, but the flower-pot bit probably would qualify, he figured.

She hadn't been able to completely disguise their passage to and from the mortal world, though, so she was high-strung to get out of the Aboveworld as quickly as possible. She caught his eye as she rubbed out Ludo's prints and prepared to send them all back to the Underground. "She will thank us later, Hoggle."

He looked glumly at the figure in Ludo's arms as the Queen's magic began to send them home. "I hopes so."

And so the party-goers inside the house, busy breaking resolutions and entirely oblivious to this interworld drama on their porch, thus also missed the abrupt disappearance of the three Underworld citizens and one of their graduate student peers.

* * * 

The scene around the quartet melted into a white hall at the Queen's Castle. Skirts in hand, she raced Ludo and Hoggle both to a nearby bedroom, where Ludo placed Sarah carefully, like a giant doll, on the bed. The Queen nodded and dusted her hands off as Hoggle shoved the door shut. No need for sneaky servants to figure out yet about their guest. "Of course she will be happy with us, Hoggle." A sharp tone entered her voice. "They have quarreled, and that is natural, a mere lovers' spat. But what woman has truly not wanted to be with my Jareth?" 

It would have taken a braver being than Hoggle at that moment to venture that even without evidence otherwise, it might still be possible for a woman to resist the High Prince's charms. Instead, he rubbed Sarah's still hand sorrowfully and wondered why she smelled of ale. 

"Besides, none of this sad business would have occurred at all if everything had happened as it should," the Queen commented, gathering her skirts and hastening around the bed to adjust Sarah's blankets. "She belongs here. She would be here now if they hadn't quarreled, and goodness knows Jareth didn't set out for that to happen. None of this spectacle would have happened if his father had taught him properly how to court a girl." Her features darkened as she tucked in a sheet. "We are only correcting a fault of his father's."

Ludo grunted softly in doubt and Hoggle nudged him in silent agreement. Both found it difficult to sympathize with the Queen's vision of her rat son as an innocent babe suffering from a dad who didn't take much interest in him. Both also knew better, despite the disparity of their intelligence, than to challenge a mother's beliefs about her son.

"My poor boy, you have heard of how miserable he has been since they fought." She leaned over and smoothed a hair back from Sarah's face. "Perhaps he was impetuous, perhaps he does not precisely understand a lady's mind, but he is desperately in love with her and I don't carry what he says, or his father says, or what you two say, I am not waiting a second longer for him to be happy and for my grandchildren to arrive." Hoggle shot Ludo a look, but Ludo, fascinated with the shine of moonlight on a candlestick, wasn't available for silent sarcastic commentary. "Sometimes matters need a woman's hand, Hoggle, and this is one of those times. Trust me."

"Yes, Majesty," he sighed in submission. 

"Now, come, boys, it isn't fitting for you to stay here while she sleeps. I will send some of my ladies in later to tidy her up. Ludo, you may stop by the castle any time for cookies and tea, but now I need you to go back to the Goblin Castle. Take my note to Jareth, don't forget, that's a good boy. Hoggle, I require your assistance with my darning—follow me to the study." And with that, she shushed them out of the darkened bedroom, closing the door softly behind them. Glancing back over his shoulder, the last vision Hoggle had was of a sleeping figure on a princess' bed, serene in the moonlight, seemingly waiting for something. Or someone.

"G'luck, Sarah," he muttered.

* * * 


	10. Getting Religion

Sarah rolled over slowly in the semi-lit room. "Gaaaaaaawwwwwwdddddddddddddddddd," she moaned into her pillow, appealing for divine intervention against the nausea that gripped her. But as all religious figures were apparently inclined to Prohibitionist sympathies on the morning after New Year's, she was left with her headache, the most godawful hangover headache she'd ever had.__

_How much did I end up having? _She yawned and tried to count drinks in her head; not surprisingly, she couldn't figure out a number. Part of that was because she'd been too intoxicated to pay much attention to count through the night, and part of that was because she couldn't even remember when, and how, her night out had ended. 

_Could be a good thing, could be a bad thing_, she rationalized. She stretched in the bed. At least there wasn't another body in the bed with her. She might have been drunk out of her mind, but at least she'd made one smart decision last night. 

She stretched again. Odd, how the bed felt so much more soft and spacious than it normally did. Well, she hadn't slept much since Christmas, and she'd poured self-abuse down her throat all yesterday, so it was probably to be expected that the bed felt like heaven compared to the hell in her dehydrated body. From the feel of her head, she hadn't bothered sucking down a bottle of water before bed, her usual immediate response to any kind of drinking. She considered making the usual New Year's resolution against ever drinking again, but discarded it with a weary sigh, knowing her own lack of will power. 

_One…two…three_. She pushed herself up with her palms and scrubbed her eyes as though it were possible to rub away her fatigue. No luck, she still felt like death. Well, only way it would get better would be to do something about it. She yawned and forced herself to slowly crack her eyelids open, bracing for the invasion of the morning light.

The eyes gradually opening grew huge, before she squeezed them shut again.

"Oh, no, no, no, no."

She made herself look again.

Yup.

_New Year's resolution #68: Quit waking up in the Underground_.

* * *

Maybe it was a good thing she was exhausted and hung over, she thought to herself, surveying her environment. It did give her an enormous amount of calm in a moment that would otherwise send her into an early heart attack.

She was in yet another strange bedroom. Not Jareth's, she was relieved to see. She was in bed alone. This too relieved her. She looked down, and was not relieved. She was wearing some low-cut misty concoction of a nightgown, decent but ridiculously romantic nonetheless; the sort of outfit every woman wants secretly but ultimately never wears, thanks to the combined forces of practicality, comfort, and God forbid, what if the meter reader should come today. 

She looked around again. No mothers were staring at her, thank goodness. And bless whoever it was who had left a giant carafe of water on the table by her bed—she chugged several glasses immediately, in gratitude.

Her gratitude ended once she noticed the absence of any Underground versions of Advil or Tylenol. She cursed the Goblin King under her breath for being a fool as well as her normal insults for him, and hauled herself ungraciously off the bed, inspecting her surroundings. 

It was dark outside, she noticed first. _But it feels like morning, I'm wide awake_. Her watch was gone—was the Goblin King a thief of property as well as people now, too?—so she couldn't tell what was going on. 

The room itself, she noticed, was quiet and simple. There were no personal effects around, so she couldn't guess if she had been in someone specific's bed, or if this was just a guest bedroom. From the size of the Underground castles she'd visited, she imagined multiple guest bedrooms had to be in order.

Now that she was out of the bed and padding around on her bare feet, she shivered slightly. Irritation flared up in her. _I'm freezing, my watch has been stolen, my clothing has been changed, I've been abducted, and the jerk didn't even leave me Tylenol_. _New Year's resolution #71: Kill Jareth._

Well, there was no Goblin King before her to throttle and despite her anger, Sarah somehow didn't think it'd be a good idea to wish herself to him at the moment, just to see him._ Particularly since he's probably sitting around right now dreaming up ways to get revenge on you for that little slapping incident. _She winced and pushed the memory aside. It was far better to get an idea of where the heck she was and investigate how she would get herself back home—sans Jareth.

"Oh, you're up and about, miss," a female voice said, and Sarah yelped, swiveling around.

There was a younger woman standing behind her, refilling her carafe. From the younger woman's outfit, it would seem she was some sort of maid. 

"Up, about, and preparing to commit murder," she muttered, feeling safe with a member of her age and gender bracket, even if the girl's world of residence was entirely different than her own. Sighing and waiting for the girl to be done with her work, Sarah plopped onto the edge of the bed. 

Rather than cursing sympathetically, as one of her grad school colleagues might have, the maid only appeared apprehensive, holding the empty carafe in front of her as if Sarah might attack at any moment. _I will attack, if he doesn't get me some damn Tylenol or Advil soon_. "Did you say commit murder, my lady?"

She rolled her eyes and flopped backwards on the bed. "Oh, please, I'm sure you've wanted to play croquet with his head at some point, too. Probably a lot more often, since you see him on a daily basis and I don't."

The maid was now staring at her as though she were mad and frothing at the mouth. "Him? I don't understand, miss."

"Jareth—you know, the Goblin King?"

"The Goblin King!" Sarah sighed. Finally, a breakthrough in interworld relations. The maid didn't jump on the bed next to her and begin reciting a litany of Jareth complaints, though. She just gaped in horror at Sarah instead. "Why would you want to harm His Majesty?"

She burned with an urge to say something sarcastic about his title but, realizing the poor girl was on the edge of panic already, decided not to upset the maid's worldview much further. "You know, I bet, since he sent you to take care of me—he brought me here."

The maid frowned immediately. "I haven't seen His Highness the Prince for several days now, miss. He's not with us at the moment, I believe. It was Her Majesty who bade me to look in on you, not the Prince."

"Fine, fine." Sarah shrugged. The girl obviously wasn't going to be a very good source of information if she didn't even know about the Goblin King's obnoxious habit of bringing certain Williams family members belowground on a regular basis. 

The maid finished her work in silence and ducked out rapidly after suggesting Sarah resume her nap. Sarah nodded in acquiescence, closing her eyes for precisely two minutes—just enough time, she figured, for the maid to move on far enough that she could break out of this pretty little jail unnoticed.

* * *

You just can't go sneaking around dark places, attempting to avoid detection, without at least one spy theme song cycling in your head. Sarah's brain had selected the "Pink Panther" theme as she slid out from behind her door, into the hall. Good, the hall was mostly dark, too. For once, she was glad for the creepy Underground tendency to skimp on lighting. She tried to walk in long strides down the corridor, afraid to run for fear her footfalls would give attention to her presence. From what she could hear and see, she wasn't in a lively part of the castle---nobody seemed to be around at all, making her wonder if this wasn't some sort of guest wing after all. The idea reassured her. She hadn't run into a goblin so far, but that didn't mean she wanted to start now. She shuddered. Or a Goblin King, for that matter.

_I have to get out of here—how the hell can I pull this off? _Every time she'd left the Underground, or entered it, she had come by way of one seductive sovereign; she hardly had a clearly designated door for easy entry and exit. Well, if she had one, unfortunately, it would be Jareth, but she was not inclined to seek him out just now. Somehow, she thought to herself, she doubted he would whirl her back home just because she asked him to. _He'd dunk me in the Bog first_, she thought, her hand stinging in memory of slapping him. 

Something fell up ahead of her and she froze. A shadow was growing from around the corner. People. Or Goblins, Fae, or whatever the hell they were, but something living, something talking, something that would end her runaway and summon Jareth. Sarah listened carefully and looked around for a niche in which to hide. _Damn! _Her dress was so white it glowed in the minimal light—there was no hiding her in this outfit, even if she could find a corner into which to duck.

These thoughts, she was abruptly reminded, were not helping her as the voices rounded the near corner and appeared to be approaching her. She sucked in her breath, switched mental tracks to "Mission: Impossible," and slid into a dark room behind her. 

"Sarah?"

* * *

She had been leaning back against the doorway, allowing herself a moment to collect her breath as she waited for the voices in the hall to pass, but her eyes flew open and she snapped upright at the sound of that terribly familiar voice. And then she choked.

"Mission: Impossible" was torn with a screech from her mental CD player and replaced with "Sex Bomb." Beyond the tune, there was very little conscious thought going through Sarah's head, actually. Because Jareth was standing across from the room from her, pale skin illuminated in the fall of moonlight streaming through the window in front of him. And because he was completely, thoroughly, entirely, gloriously, bless-the-deity-who-made-that naked. 

* * *

Women generally know as they reach adulthood if they are "good" or "bad" girls. You can play one role or another at times, but given a particular moment, one particular side of you will always come out. So Sarah, cursing herself inside for her foolish innocence, automatically snapped around to the door, her hands scraping for the doorknob while she resisted every natural urge within her that clamored to turn back for a good—_very good--_long look.

Not that one second hadn't been enough to send her into hormonal overdrive. She hadn't actually seen very much—he was standing with his back to her when she'd entered the room, apparently, and he had been looking over his shoulder to say her name, a look no doubt as stunned as hers on his face. Beyond that, she really hadn't seen much at all. Well, just enough to know why so many statues had been carved over time in honor of the male body, and just enough to let her know that maybe the "Buns of Steel" program worked for some people, after all. 

But still, she wasn't waiting to pour over the memories—she was clawing at the door in the semi-dark, trying to find the handle. Moonlight was the only illumination in room, and while it chose to drape Jareth in loving luminosity, the moon had no interest in maintaining easily visible emergency exits from the room.

She heard him stride rapidly up behind her, his bare hands falling on her upper arms, squeezing her still; she shut her eyes and put her hands helplessly against the wood of the door. "Sarah? Sarah!" When she didn't answer, she felt herself turned around—she'd shut her eyes, but at the surprising motion, they opened just enough to see his slightly tousled hair, the predatory gleam in his eye, and his bare chest before she slammed them shut again. "What are you doing? How did you get here?" She trembled and gulped down a breath, waiting for some snide comment, some retaliation for slapping him before. Instead, his hands loosened on her arms suddenly, his fingers caressing. "Never mind, you've come to me, that's all that matters." His hair brushed her face as he began to whisper to her; she could feel his breath against her cheek and throat. "Why are you so afraid, little one? I will not reward your courage with anger, I promise…" One of her fisted hands was lifted and she felt—oh, God help her—his lips press, feather-light, against the skin there. He laughed softly, tenderly, running his hands back up her trembling arms. "You have amazed me twice tonight, love. Am I to believe Sarah Williams would find a way to come to me to apologize, only to abandon her goal in fear at the last minute?"

She hadn't the slightest clue what he meant, other than to lavish himself with undeserved praise. She snatched her hand back. "I didn't come to you," she hissed. "You brought me here and I was lost, that's all."

His hands on her upper arms tightened, and his voice was suddenly cool. "I did not bring you here."

Her eyes almost popped open again with disbelief, but she reminded herself of what was in front of her, bit her lip to distract herself from the delicious mental image, and kept her lids nailed shut. "Yeah, right."

"Sarah," he said, and this time his voice had a distant, majestic edge. Each word fell like a weight dropped in the stillness of the room. "_I did not bring you here_."

She uttered a wordless exclamation of protest and he sighed impatiently. "Sarah, look at me." She shook her head. _Yeah, right_. "Sarah," he repeated, this time in command. "Look at me _now_."

"No!"

"You are the most—gods above, woman, what is it now?" he exclaimed.

She knew she was blushing and she knew it had to be visible; whether the room was barely lit or not, her skin would be a fluorescent red. "I can't talk to you when—oh, be decent and put some clothes on!"

"Oh, for—" he began in irritation, before interrupting himself. "Sarah, I've been dressed for the past five minutes. Now will you at least look me in the eye?"

She actually snuck a peek to look him all over, just to double-check his claim. He was indeed dressed—some kind of dark loose pants and a dark, untied robe. As ever, he managed to look wonderfully indecent while still being technically respectably clad. She swallowed. It really was so utterly wrong. The robe, left open as if in protest at wearing anything at all, gleamed like silk. It fell temptingly away from his bare upper body as he pressed his hands into the door by her head, and stared down at her. Not happily, either, she noted with a shiver. His eyes were narrow and his voice cool when he finally spoke. "Now what in the name of your heavens is going on? I'm not fond of being misled, Sarah." 

"I don't know what is going on!" She was frustrated, but not furious—he wasn't being nasty (yet) about the unfortunate slapping incident, and since she had no idea where she was or how to get home, being with someone who could provide the answers to both questions was suddenly a comforting thought. "I woke up about a minute or two down the hall, I have no idea at all how I got here, or got into this nightgown—" she flared the skirt out in her hands demonstratively, but noticed as she looked up that Jareth's eyes preferred to hover around the plunging neckline. She cleared her throat pointedly. His attention returned to her face, an unapologetic, taunting curve to his mouth.

She continued on hurriedly. "I was trying to find a way out, I heard someone coming, I ducked in here, and that's all I know. Other than that you can dress fast."

"And undress quite quickly, too, I assure you." He smirked. She scowled, but he continued on. "But let us return to the question at hand, how you came to be here—" His eyes drifted over her analytically, before he suddenly took her by the wrist and backing up, led her closer to the center of the room. With a wave of his other hand, the candles across the room blazed up, stripping the room of its shadows. He was frowning now, rubbing her palm unconsciously between his hands, as he scrutinized her. 

"Have you a headache?"

She shrugged with difficulty; her body was too tense under his probing gaze. "Yesterday was New Year's Eve, I had a little too much." _Now let's wait for the jokes_.

But he didn't joke, didn't even crack a naughty grin or a comment about "too much." "No, that's not it…" he seemed to murmur to himself, releasing her hand and bringing his fingers lightly to her temples. He slid them against her scalp experimentally, searching her eyes for some reaction. She felt nauseous—from the nerves caused by his proximity or her intense hangover, she didn't know. Frowning again when she only stared back at him, he slipped one hand beneath her chin and another around the back of her head, intent on turning her head to the side. His motions were arrested, however, as a brilliant flash of pain blinded her, causing her to instinctively shy back. "Ow, damn it!"

Jareth released her immediately but was at her back before she could open her eyes again. His fingertips brushed over her hair, parting the locks a little at one point, then easing them down again. She started to jerk around to ask him what was going on, but his hand flew forward and stopped her. "Be still, Sarah. You will bring more pain upon yourself if you turn too quickly and happen to bump into me." He paused. "You have no memory of what happened to bring you here, you said? No memory of being injured?"

"No, no, I don't. What are you thinking? What's happened to me?" she exclaimed, anxiously. 

He was in front of her again, his hands moving over her arms with a surprising degree of gentleness. "Shhh, give me a moment, love." 

She froze but kept her eyes on him beseechingly. She might doubt his intentions and his honor, but she didn't doubt his either intelligence or his power.

Not, she would have admitted, that she wasn't still afraid. Particularly as his mouth tightened and he moved forward quickly, one hand firm at the small of her back, the other palm diving to rest startling low on her abdomen. It was low enough to make her body burn and automatically shy away, but the hand at her back kept her secure. Her protesting hand rested pointlessly over his. "Shhh, be still," he murmured, his eyes still examining her face intensely. 

At last, his hands fell back and he moved a half-step away from her, enough to give her a better sense of breathing room, but close enough still to give her—well, yes, she would admit it to herself, a sense of security. "Someone struck you on the head, Sarah," he said quietly. "It was deliberate."

"_What?!" _She would have screamed it, but fatigue made her throat hoarse.

His hands caught hers again and squeezed. "That's all that happened, I can swear that to you now." His eyes focused intently on hers. "I made certain of it, Sarah. You were not--touched in any other way." Her lungs forgot to operate at this possibility; her heart likewise failed when he first glanced down at their hands, then locked his gaze intently with hers again. "I would have killed whoever touched you, know that." Dazed, she emitted a slight whimper; his arm was immediately around her lower back and before she knew it, she was in his arms, her head resting against his chest and shoulder. "I still might." His hand swept up over her hair and a cooling sensation moved along her scalp. "There. You will be slightly tender in that area for a day, but otherwise, you are healed now."

What did you say in such a situation? She'd wanted to kill him the last time she'd seen him, and now—now, now he was holding her as fast against him as if the circle of his arms would forever ensure her safety. She breathed in his scent—slightly sweaty, she realized, and wondered what he'd been doing. "Um, thanks."

Something warm brushed her hair—had he just kissed the top of her head? "I should have known," she heard him say above her. "I should have felt it…Someone must have…" The arms around her tensed suddenly. 

She might not trust her own reactions, but she trusted his. She jerked her head up to search his face. "What? What is it?" 

His mouth was still a line and his eyes clouded; he gave a slight shake of his head. "You needn't worry." 

"You're telling me not to worry and you're also telling me I've been assaulted without knowing it—you expect me not to worry?"

"I expect you to be Sarah," he responded, now offering her a wry smile. "To be difficult." 

"Oh, stop it," she muttered, tapping his shin in a faux-kick with her toe. He chuckled lightly and drew back from her. 

"I have business to attend to. You will stay here, love." He waved his head toward the bed; the blankets on one side flipped down in welcome. 

"Business? Now? And you seriously expect me to—" Sarah got no further as Jareth rapidly advanced on her; she retreated automatically, colliding against the bed as he'd intended and landing precisely at the spot of the lifted blankets. Jareth's eyes gleamed triumphantly at her and she opened her mouth to retort, but he merely grinned and flicked the blankets over her legs with his hand. The playful mood disappeared, as he slipped down to her hip, reaching forward and taking both of her hands in his own, drawing her towards him. 

"You must promise to stay here, Sarah."

"But, Jareth—"

"You must stay here. I cannot risk you." Something quivered within her at the urgency in his voice. "You will be safe here, as none who wish me or mine harm may enter here."

She laughed shakily, unnerved by the sudden turn of events and, if she admitted it, the idea of being left alone. "So why did it let me in?" 

He smirked knowingly, obnoxiously. "It's not harm you wish me." Too old to stick out her tongue, she settled for rolling her eyes. He pressed her hands again and returned to his subject. "I've always had security spells on my bed chambers, and I assure you, there are a few extra in place as of now. _Nothing_ will be able to touch you in here, Sarah, I promise that to you. I will be back as quickly as I can, but till then, you must stay here and try to rest."

With a small groan of objection, she permitted him to push her back into the pillows. "Fine, fine, I'll wait here…Just do me a favor first…"

"Yes?" His hand was on his knee, poised to stand.

"Leave me some Advil?"

His laugh was a powerful medicine in its own right. "But of course. And Sarah?"

She made the mistake, as always, of answering. "Yes?"

His eyes slid down to the low neckline, before flicking up to meet hers again.

"They're much better than the Lady Alexandra's."

* * * 

_Well, she did it all right, just as she said, _Hoggle thought, listening to the mild uproar in the castle's great hall as people rushed to follow the Goblin King's commands. 

The dwarf fidgeted and tried to avoid Jareth's eye. The King was still in his night clothes and bare feet, either unaware or unconcerned about his state of dress as he interrogated the staff.

_Avoid talking to him if you can. If he is not too swept up in thinking about her, he will recognize your deception_. 

Remembering the Queen's instructions, he had stayed quiet and away from Jareth since the moment he'd run into the King a couple of hours ago. He'd been on his way to the kitchen to get a mug of ale when he'd heard his name barked behind him; turning, he saw the Goblin King striding down the hallway forcefully, his robe flying behind him like black wings. 

It had happened quicker than the Queen had expected, but otherwise, her predictions had been spot-on. _Expect him in the evening. I have sent him a note asking him to come at once, to discuss a treaty offer for the kingdom. He will come, but he will ride here, so expect him in the evening. Give him no information on my whereabouts, should he ask to see me. _

_I do not know when they will meet. They are but rooms apart; it is only a matter of time. Give her till morning if she has not arisen already, and then allow her to be "discovered" and brought to him, if he has not already come upon her. You will know when you see him if he has come upon her or not._

Hoggle nodded to himself. There hadn't been any doubt in him at all when he spotted the High Prince back under his mother's roof. He still quailed a little at the sight of the Goblin King, but he knew the King's murderous rage at him before had somehow been redirected to another target. That could only mean he'd found Sarah.

"By the gods, Hoggle, what is happening here? When did Sarah get here, and how?" he'd asked. The dwarf pretended to be bewildered by the question, but the King did not notice how poor his acting was. _He is blind to all else when he thinks of her, Hoggle. She was nearly in the Goblin Castle last time before he noticed her approach, because he was daydreaming about her. We must not hesitate to use this to our advantage. _

Again, the High Prince did what his mother had expected, asking for the Queen.

"I don't knows where she is, Majesty," he'd said and it was true—he really didn't, although he knew what Jareth did not: the Queen had already left. She'd given instructions to her steward to inform Jareth later that she'd been called away to his father's. _He will be looking for me. I have left word with the steward that I have been called to his father's on an urgent matter. He will not follow. _

Sure enough, the Goblin King had made no move to fly off to the High King's. _He will not let her out of his sight_, she had said. _He will immediately assume she is under threat and he will be obsessed with securing her safety. If he wants to station the guards, do not intervene. _

Hoggle rubbed his hand against the jewelry hanging from his belt, a gift of the Queen's. _Courage, Hoggle. He will come to the bottom of this shortly, but we may count on his feelings for her to delay the development of his suspicions. And we may be sure he will not release her until he is certain he has the answer, and to do that, he will need to see me. I will see to it that does not happen too quickly. Let us remember our goal: the longer he has her by his side, the better for them both. _

Hoggle grunted. He hadn't even seen Sarah yet, so he had no idea if the rest of the Queen's predictions had begun to come true. _She will be too confused to be hostile and distrustful of him, and he will be too worried for her to continue this nonsense of hiding his heart from her. It is only a matter of time, Hoggle, be sure of that. _

* **

Dawn was just warming the sky when Sarah finally woke up again. Jareth had vanished after his saucy parting comment, but the pillow she'd thrown after him was still on the floor, she noted. And the Goblin King himself still remained absent.

She stirred restlessly. She'd slept God knows how long before her encounter with Jareth, and she'd just been packed off for another six hours of sleep. _I won't need to sleep for another month at this rate_. 

What was there to do? She could hardly call Jareth—it wasn't as if he sported a beeper or a cell phone. And she wasn't about to set foot outside of the room, knowing now that something had actually attacked her in the world outside of Jareth's protection. _Who would have thought I would want to be here?_

She glanced around the room again. She really was in Jareth's world now—not just one of his homes, but actually in his bedroom. Curiosity piqued her and she began to look around at the furnishings more carefully. She hadn't really had the time to inspect her environment the last time she was here. To find out what sort of person the Goblin King was behind, literally, closed doors.

A slight sense of guilt, mixed with unabashed delight, washed over her as she tip-toed around the room. He was apparently somewhat tidy—she didn't see any clothing left out, although a cape was slung casually over one of the chairs by the fireplace, and near the window was a pile of fabric and his tumbled boots, apparently the outfit he'd been in the process of removing when she'd stumbled in on him. _He must have forgotten to pick it up because of all the crap about me_, she thought to herself. Glancing over at the door with a slight flush on her cheeks, she bent quickly and poked through the pile. One of his typical billowy shirts, still smelling heavenly of his scent. She allowed herself the brief indulgence of nuzzling it. His breeches, which made her blush further just remembering their contents. Fabric that was apparently the socks for beneath his boots—only two, she noted with a sigh of internal relief; there was no need to discard certain dreams just yet.

She rose and moved closer to the window; there were a few white feathers on the floor in the corner, forgotten. She shrugged and head around the bed to the desk, where she saw a variety of items. A few curious models perched on the top—one she recognized as a mock-up of the Labyrinth, and the others, while clearly puzzles, she didn't recognize. On the blotter, her eyes swept over a scattering of papers—the book his mother had left, still untouched; what looked like a set of petitions from his subjects, marked up in his hand and signed with a single "J"; what appeared to be a couple of theater programs. _He likes drama? Figures_. The trash basket next to that side of the desk was overflowing—she looked closer and saw an extremely large stack of unopened letters, tied up in a ribbon, with two notes on top. One was formal, in a male hand: "Diverse Notes and Messages of Admiration from Ladies of the Realm to His Highness (edition: December)." The other was a small lavender note with flowers printed on it and a gold crown stamped on top; a feminine hand had written, "Now do you see why the Castle's mail is so slow? Stop smiling at them! --M." Sarah snorted and turned back to the desk. One of his crystals, sitting on a golden claw base, sparkled in its position as a sort of paper-weight. Playing cards were stacked in the corner, a jester's card on top. There was a cameo of his mother in the shelf on his desk, and a framed black and white sketch of the Labyrinth. She peered closer at it and saw a familiar "J" penciled there. _Jareth, an artist? I'd never have thought he'd have the patience_. She hunted further. The room was maddeningly spare—but then again, she reminded herself, it was hardly his primary residence and he probably didn't keep many personal effects there. That disappointing thought didn't keep her from looking on. There was a riding crop with a jeweled "J" on the chair by the forgotten cloak. A decorative staff leaned against the fireplace. Above it hung a painting of an owl in a tree—she studied it carefully but decided it was merely decorative, not a reference to Jareth's ability to shape-shift. She poked her head next through a door by the back wall and found an enormous, overstocked wardrobe; she laughed and backed out quickly, before she became lost in _that_ Labyrinth. 

So far, she hadn't found anything too interesting. All she knew more about him now was that he could draw and even more women than she thought were throwing themselves at him. Nothing that told her more about what went on in that head of his. She tapped her foot in irritation. "Oh, come on, every guy has some stuff," she muttered to herself. Remembering Toby's latest disgrace, she slid a hand between the mattresses—nope, Jareth apparently didn't subscribe to the same sort of magazines Toby had been caught with. She sat down on the bed, where the blankets were still made, and inspected the night table. He'd left his pendant there, the chain hanging off the edge as though the pendant had been tossed down carelessly. Farther back on the table, behind the candlestick, there was a book left open and she craned her neck to read the spine without moving it.

"If he's reading Tom Clancy like my father, I'll scream," she muttered aloud.

She couldn't see the title so she knelt on the bed, stretched over, and flipped up the cover to peek inside. Her eyebrows smashed into her hairline. _The Underground Karma Sutra?! _And there were mysterious check marks by some of the positions—actually, she found out, thoughtlessly snatching up the book and flipping through it rapidly, quite a lot of them. _Wonder what they're—_

She reddened and dropped the book. "Oh."

Well, you couldn't say Jareth didn't appreciate the value of research. 

Very hands-on research.

She swallowed and thrust the book hastily back into its spot on the table. As she leaned over the table, she spotted a small niche cut into the top corner of the table—an invisible drawer, she discovered, slipping her fingertip into the niche and sliding the drawer out. Leaning over, she saw the typical chaos that accumulates in any human being's drawers over time. "Finally, he's normal." Not wanting to actually dig into the pile, Sarah kept her hands against the bedspread and peered in. A small bottle—_oil? _Her skin warmed. A book on diplomacy, binding like new. A small, black book, unmarked.

"Oh, for God's sake, he's got a little black book?" she muttered aloud in disgust. She glared into the drawer for a moment, then succumbed to curiosity and snatched it out of the drawer. "So let's see who the sluts are."

Her fingers flung open the cover furiously, randomly throwing the pages open, then shook. _It's me._ There she was, sketched lightly in some sort of pencil, asleep on his bed as she had been when he brought her here to sleep before. She bit her lip. It wasn't even a suggestive pose, either—she actually appeared rather innocent, a bit of a smile on her face as it was pressed into the pillow, her body rather absurdly snuggled into the bed.

She let out a breath slowly, staring down at her image with wonder. The picture was undeniably realistic, but there was something in the picture that she couldn't deny was, well, affectionate. _What the hell? _She frowned in confusion. The drawing was very well done, too, for the little sketch it was. Not that—she glanced over at the book on the table with a sudden warmth inside—it wasn't already obvious that when Jareth tried to do something, he aspired to surpass the highest expectations.

Curiously, she flipped a few pages forward. Goblins in the courtyard. The approach of a carriage from the hills beyond the window. A bird's eye—owl's eye, she corrected herself—view of the Queen's Castle. Just small, random sketches of life, as if he hadn't the time to devote himself to more than a snapshot of the world around him.

She wanted to study the sketch-book further but reminded herself she shouldn't have been looking at it to begin with. _If he catches me with this, I can hardly tell him I opened it because I thought it was a datebook and I was jealous. Besides, who knows, do I really want to find a drawing of one of his women in there, doing God-knows-what? _She shot an irritable glance over at the bedside reference book and shoved the sketch-book back into the night table.

She stood up and dusted off her nightgown. So what else had she missed? Where else did Toby hide his private items? She glanced down dubiously at the bedskirt. Would someone who lived in a castle really throw things under the bed? 

Well, there was only one way to find out. She dropped to her knees, adjusting her nightgown so she didn't spill out of it, and peered under the bed, half-fearing she'd find herself staring at a discarded heap of wildly shredded lingerie. 

Instead, she stared at a rather boring, plain floor. She squinted, trying to be sure that all of the darker areas were merely dark and not hiding anything of significance.

"I hope the view is as enjoyable for you as it is for me," a male voice addressed her suddenly. 

She stiffened and glanced up rapidly. Jareth was leaning against one of the chairs casually, still gloriously half-dressed, his robe hanging open invitingly. She blinked again and made herself look up into his eyes. _Don't look at the chest, don't look directly at the chest…_

There was humor in his gaze, but more than that, a startling hunger, the look of a lion taking his time before the last lunge at a wounded deer. Surprised, she followed his eyes and gasped—the generous neckline of her nightgown had, in her kneeling position, slid forward again and now the majority of her chest was visible to the eye. 

She grabbed the nightgown's neckline and clutched it to her chest as she leapt to her feet, adjusting it to a decent position again with a wordless cry.

"Such a pity," he murmured, although she had the strong sense he was still undressing her mentally. 

"Oh, you _would_—"

He lifted a bemused eye to hers. "I most definitely would." 

She folded her hands over her chest to provide some sort of further covering from his inspecting gaze. "Would you quit it?"

He smiled still and strode with a certain swagger over to the bed, allowing himself to fall onto it and stretch out as he regarded her. "Not when you tempt me beyond reason, love." She gaped and he patted the bed next to him. "Sit a moment, I need to speak with you." She hesitated, eyeing him suspiciously. He laughed outright. "I won't rip your dress off of you, I promise. Not without your permission, rather." He arched an eyebrow flirtatiously before patting the bed again, his expression turning serious. "Sit, Sarah, I need to discuss matters with you."

She edged up to the bed reluctantly before accepting his hand, the grasp of the Goblin King drawing her down to him.

* * *

She waited for him to speak, but he only looked at her reflectively for a long minute. 

Finally, he straightened his bent arm, raising himself off the bed to study her face more closely. 

"I'm taking you to the Goblin Castle." 

* * *


	11. Private Matters

His hand restrained her from leaping up and away from him. "What?!"

"Calm yourself." She didn't miss the fact he hadn't released her hand. "We must go home. What I told you of the spells on this room is tenfold more true of the Goblin Castle. As the seat of my kingdom, it has even stronger protection spells. Do not doubt me, love. You entered before because the realm knew you meant me no harm. You would not have passed otherwise." His voice became more urgent. "Sarah, I do not yet have an explanation for your injury. I can sense with my magic you were struck, deliberately, but I cannot tell you by whom or why. And until I have that information, I cannot assume you are safe." 

"But why would anyone want to hurt me?" she asked and bit her lip. 

His shoulders lifted in a shrug. "I would rather believe this to be an innocent affair, but there are other possibilities. I do have enemies, Sarah."

She glanced back at him with a frown. "But then why hurt me?"

He sighed and rose from the bed, pulling her with him. "Let us not speculate further until more is known. Now, we need to make ready for the journey. You may use my bath—through that doorway, there—and I have had the staff retrieve your dress from my mother's ball for you to wear temporarily. The seamstresses will have more practical clothing for you at my castle by the time we arrive. There's fruit on the desk for you, should you be hungry in my absence, but there will be food when we travel, as well."

"Travel? You mean you're not going to just move me there, like that?"

"My enemies would anticipate that route and could attack. Since that magic requires a great deal of energy and I am not fully rested, I would be exposing you to danger to take you to the castle by that route. Instead, you will travel by coach, with an armed escort." 

"Just me?" Her voice rose, slightly panicked. Some part of her understood that it was better to have Jareth by her side than any kind of armed escort. Soldiers could lose; Jareth could not. "Not you? I'd be by myself?"

The hand holding hers tightened briefly. "Never." 

* * *

_This is almost like being alone, _she complained to herself. She glanced over at her companion in the carriage.

_Hoggle is acting really weird_, she thought, as the coach wheels crunched on the road beneath them. 

The dwarf was sitting across from her, quieter than he normally was, and busy staring out the window as he swung his feet in the air, unable to reach the ground from his seat. 

With his silent company, she had no distraction from the sickening images in her head. She couldn't take her mind off what had happened to her…or rather, what she didn't remember happening to her. Anxiety twisted in her throat—what could have done this to her? And was she only really struck on the head? She shivered slightly, far too aware of the fact she had been vulnerable to God-knows-whom in the time she had been unconscious, and before. 

She groaned softly and tried to shove the worries aside. It_ wouldn't be so bad if I had somebody else with me…_She'd been surprised when she was escorted out into the courtyard and found out Hoggle was to accompany her in the carriage. They were surrounded by armed men, but no Goblin Kings. She glanced over at Hoggle, wondering if she should ask him. _No, he'd just get the wrong idea. I only want to know what's going on, that's all. And let's face it, Hoggle isn't exactly the same as Jareth when it comes to protection…or needing it…_She sighed. _What has he done to my mind??_

She tucked her hands further into the snowy fur-like material that made giant cuffs on her cloak sleeves. It was very warm, whatever the fabric was. The maid who had brought the cloak to her had explained Jareth had borrowed it from his mother's wardrobe for her, given she had no coat.

And was only wearing, rather absurdly, a velvet ballgown that lacked shoulders. Fine for a ball, but a bit too chilly for winter wear, she sighed to herself. She was grateful for the cloak—without it, she _would_ be freezing. 

"Hey." She stretched out a foot and tapped the toe of Hoggle's boot. "Earth---I mean, Underground to Hoggle."

The dwarf finally glanced over her. _Why does he look nervous? Have I bitten his head off and forgotten it?_ "What's on yer mind, Sarah?"

"How much farther is it?"

He shrugged. "Don't know. I usually don't comes this way. I don't think we've gotten very far yet, though—over there, see, that village? Behind that is where Her Majesty lives, so we ain't got far at all."

"Oh," she sighed. _They definitely need to learn about shocks here_. "Well, what way do you normally go? And why not this one? Is this the slower way?" _I'll kill Jareth if he's sending me on some interminable backroads trip. I've gotten lost enough times on earth; I don't need to stop at an Underground gas station for directions, thanks._

_ "_I don't normally rides, I mean. I hates these big carts." Sarah looked more closely—well, yes, he did look a bit green. 

Fortunately for Hoggle, the carriage seemed to slow down and she heard a stilling of the hoofbeats around them. "We're stopping? What's going on?"

"Guess it's him," muttered Hoggle. 

Before she could interrogate the dwarf, the door opened and her eyes met those of the Goblin King. "Good morning, my lady." She tore hers away, a bit flustered, as he turned to Hoggle. "Ready?"

"Yeah, let's go," Hoggle grunted. "See yas in a little bit, Sarah."

"Whaaa--?" The men disappeared before she could bid Hoggle farewell to wherever; she peered out the window, looking for them, only to jump once more as the door on the other side of the carriage opened. 

"I hope you've had a pleasant ride," Jareth said, stepping up into the coach as someone outside shut the door. There was a distant male cry, then the hoofbeats and wheel-turns resumed. 

She barely noticed the movement, however, as Jareth was not taking Hoggle's place, but seating himself next to her. "How are you enjoying the trip? Comfortable?"

She stared at him. He was back in all black again and he was just too lethally masculine for the scrolls and frills inside the white coach. "What are you doing here?"

"Just what I said I would, of course." He adjusted his gloves, then glanced around the cabin. "A bit nippy in here, isn't it?"

"It's January, I guess it is to be expected," she mumbled, watching him. He got up, bent over the opposite bench, and returned with a folded up blanket that he proceeded to unwrap and drape over her legs and his own. "Thanks."

"Always a pleasure," he said, leaning back against the cushion, folding his arms behind his neck and closing his eyes. "Is there anything else you need?"

"Where's Hoggle? Did you just kick him out?" She felt alarmed—why did he want to be alone with her?

His eye cracked open and he turned his face to her. "Hoggle has carriage-sickness. He will be ill if he rides for long. So I used magic to send him home."

"But I thought you said—"

He waved his hand, cutting her off. "To use magic to move a person requires energy and I have sufficient energy to send a dwarf to his gardens, believe me. My objection before was that to move _you_, I might be opening us up to an attack, because I would then be more vulnerable before whomever would wish you harm." He smiled lazily. "I would still of course kill them, but it would be bothersome."

"Oh." She broke their gaze and adjusted the blanket. She briefly considered asking him further about what his magic could tell him of her injury, but in the quiet of the coach, where escape was not possible, she couldn't bring herself to raise the topic. She bit her lip, thinking. Her eyes spotted a gleam at her side and she moved the blanket back curiously.

"My sword," Jareth said, hands still resting behind his neck comfortably.

She stared at the long sword-sheath attached to his left hip. Jareth had appeared before her regularly in semi-armored outfits but for some reason, she had never imagined him wielding a weapon other than his magic. Tentatively, she reached forward and put a hand on the ball of the hilt; when he didn't move to stop her, she put her other hand on the hilt and tugged the sword upwards a little, to explore the hilt design and the start of the blade. 

She glanced up as she tugged on his sword and his mouth was just beginning to twist wickedly. "I know the joke you're going to make, so don't even say it."

"Wicked creature. I am sure I have no idea what you mean."

"Yeah, right." She eased the sword back into the sheath. "It's so heavy." Her fingers traced the designs on the grip. There was a triangular design on the ball of the hilt, just like his necklace, she saw. 

"Not so heavy for those who know how to wield it."

"Do you use it a lot?" She swallowed and glanced nervously at the window past him, imagining a horde of sword-waving soldiers storming down on them. 

"There will be no need for it on this journey, never fear," he said. He turned against the seat to face her, tossing an arm over the top of the seat, the other resting against his legs, stretched to the side, ankles crossed. His lips curved playfully. "I'll tell you a secret. The outfit requires it for full effect."

She rolled her eyes and turned slightly to glance at the window behind her. "So why weren't you with me from the start? Had more trouble accessorizing?"

"No, I thought it best for you if we were not seen leaving together, to invite less attention to our movements." He turned slightly to lean back fully against the seat, and closed his eyes once more.

"You keep doing that—are you sick?" She leaned over to inspect the lines of his pale face, the shadows hanging beneath the eyes. 

His eyes opened and she jerked back, embarrassed at being caught inspecting him. "I am not ill, merely fatigued." His eyes slid shut again and his lips turned up in a naughty smile. "A beautiful woman kept me up all night." He yawned. "And the ungrateful little thing did not grant me the usual compensation for such a sacrifice. I'm quite upset. It was most…unfair."

"Oh, stop!" The corner of his mouth twitched, but he remained silent. "You're terrible."

"Terribly handsome, I'd agree, yes."

"Don't you stop?"

"I do tend to have a great deal of stamina, I'm told."

She threw her hands up in frustration, turning to the side so she could watch the forests pass by and not look at him. "Just shut up and go to sleep already."

"With you, with pleasure," he murmured.

* * * 

The remainder of the trip was a brief eternity for Sarah. Jareth slept silently, slouched down in his seat, one hand resting lightly on his flat abdomen while the other rested over hers. His legs were extended across the carriage so that his boots were propped on the other bench; she had offered, rather eagerly, to move to the other side in order to give him more room, but he merely responded that he wouldn't "dream of inconveniencing a lady," and left a hand on her wrist to keep her next to him.

So, sitting there with his gloved hand a gentle clamp over her wrist, Sarah stared out of the window and tried to banish the edginess that Jareth, even a sleeping Jareth, elicited within her. She swallowed and hazarded a glance at him. Teasing banter or not, she wasn't certain on what footing she stood with him. She had expected that if she saw him again after their Christmas argument, he would be angry and vengeful, perhaps even vicious. He didn't have the sweetest temper in the world to begin with, and given that she'd hauled off and belted him, she knew she was asking for his worst. But since walking in on him in his bedroom—she gulped at the memory and the temperature of the skin under his glove suddenly soared—he had not really brought up that encounter. Instead, he'd alternated between a serious concern for her safety and his old shameless flirtation. _Must be because he's a king_, she thought, watching his chest swell and then slowly lower as he exhaled. _He feels responsible for the people—goblins, whatever—around him. But he's not tossing me in the Bog like I'm a goblin._ _He's acting like I'm—_she couldn't decide what it was. A subject? But she doubted there would be armed guards escorting an ordinary subject across the Underground realms. She doubted whether he'd act as a personal bodyguard for a subject, either. So why was he here?

As she was contemplating that point, she heard voices suddenly outside of the carriage and peered out the window in alarm. _Guess we've arrived. This isn't DisneyLand,_ _that's for sure,_ her brain offered sarcastically, taking in the misshapen black fortress that was the Goblin Castle. _Just like before_. She shivered, half-fearing she'd hear an infant Toby's cry again from within that castle.

"Welcome home." She jerked around in surprise to see Jareth straightening in his seat, one of his hands going up to ruffle the back of his hair into place. _Like he can tell if it's messed up!_ His expression was cool and alert as he regarded the castle walls passing by the window as the coach came to a halt.

Outside, a male voice cried out, "His Majesty, the King!" and she heard a small roar of other voices. _Human? Fae? Since when are they here? _

Jareth, she saw, was rising from his seat at the crier's introduction. He stepped lightly out of the coach, his long black cloak swirling behind his legs as he descended. The volume of the crowd lifted as Jareth appeared, but Sarah couldn't make out precisely what they were saying from her position in the enclosed coach—apparently just greeting their king enthusiastically, from the sound of it. 

She didn't have time to be puzzled about their response to him, however, as she suddenly saw Jareth's hand before her. He looked decidedly amused by her confusion. "Coming, love? They won't bite, I promise." She allowed him to take her hand and moved towards the door; on the step, his hands moved suddenly to her waist, lifting her smoothly from the carriage to the ground. His mouth to her ear momentarily, he finished his thought with a purr: "Only I'll do that, love."

She reddened and tried to step away automatically, but his gloved hand caught hers easily and roped it back around his arm. He seemed about to comment, but a man appeared at his elbow, saying something quickly. She took the opportunity of his distraction to survey her surroundings. 

They were in the center of a large courtyard, which was packed with people. There were more people, and goblins, in the windows of the castle beyond, she saw. With a deeper flush, she realized they were staring at her just as curiously as she was staring at them, the women with overt hostility. _Great, his harem's jealous_. 

She knew his vanity well but surprisingly, he didn't stick around to lap up the crowd's admiration. "Make way! Make way for the King!" the crier was shouting, and a lane appeared instantly in the crowd. _Convenient. _

"Come," she heard him murmur, and found herself hustling alongside his long strides into the castle. A retinue of people—his entourage, she thought, briefly imagining what Jareth would have looked like running the New York Marathon with Puff Daddy; she had to duck her head in her hood to hide her snickers—galloped alongside them, all piping up with brief comments in answer to Jareth's rapidly barked questions.

They passed the throne room, she saw. _No chickens at least,_ she thought, shuddering. There were still goblins here and there, and apparently, they were either quite friendly or had a good memory, as one actually grinned at her and waved as the royal gathering sailed past.

Jareth stopped suddenly and she had to put her free hand against his side to avoid plowing into him. He glanced back at her, eyes dancing with dark amusement. "You wanted something, my dear?"

She was sure her skin could not turn a darker shade of tomato as she felt the entourage's attention now completely directed towards her; out of the corner of her eye, she saw eyebrows lifting knowingly. "No, ah, sorry, just wasn't paying attention."

He nodded slowly and the corner of his mouth twitched. She realized she hadn't seen him smile since they'd been in the coach together. _This must be his game face—his "professional" behavior. _She wasn't sure if she was glad for the reprieve of being teased outright or more frightened at the knowledge he was saving up his comments for later.

"I see, no matter." The crowd rustled and more eyebrows lifted. Jareth ignored them and shot a glance to his side. "Hoggle!"

"I'm here, I'm here, Majesty," she heard the dwarf mutter as he shoved through the crowd to their feet. Sarah was so grateful to see a familiar, friendly face that she broke loose of Jareth's arm and fell to her knees to hug the dwarf enthusiastically.

"Oh, Hoggle, I hope you're feeling better! I missed you!" 

He jumped backwards and she frowned. She'd hugged Hoggle plenty of times and while he was not the type to feel at ease in an embrace, he still didn't normally act as if she had some godawful disease when she hugged him.

"Yes, indeed." A cool voice over her shoulder reminded her that Jareth was still there. Hoggle's gaze, turned toward the Goblin King, dropped briefly and Sarah thought she saw the dwarf pale and shiver.

She began to reach out to Hoggle again, in concern, but a hand brushed over her shoulder—barely touching her, cold gloved fingers only drifting over the skin bared by her dress and the cloak that had fallen behind her shoulders, but an intimate invasion all the same. Her head jerked upwards to catch an icy glance from the Goblin King. "Yes, indeed, we do wish you health, _Hoggle_." _He got his name right? Well, thank God for that! But why does it sound just as bad as if he'd gotten his name wrong?_ The mismatched eyes, in their wintry tones, slid over to the dwarf now. "You will escort the lady to my chambers and arrange for anything that she might need." _His bedroom? _Somehow, that seemed ten times more awful than waiting for him amid the goblins of the throne room. 

She rose awkwardly to her feet; she might have stumbled, but a firm hand beneath her elbow kept her steady. "But I'm not—"

Sarah had wanted to say she wasn't tired and didn't need to go to bed yet again—_I've probably been in bed the last twenty four hours!_—but he didn't give her the chance. "Go with_ your friend_ now." His tone was an outright sneer and she blinked in surprise. _What the hell? _He was more emotionally unsteady than she was, and she at least had the excuse of PMS! Beside her, Hoggle took her free hand in his quivering one. "I will come to you later." The Goblin King turned from her and strode away, his followers shooting curious looks back at her, but none staying back with herself and Hoggle.

"What the hell was that?"

Hoggle sighed below and tugged her towards the opposite direction. "Just dos me a favor and don't go bein' girly on me in front of him again, Sarah."

* * *

Surprisingly, it didn't take long to get to Jareth's quarters. Sarah would've thought they were tucked somewhere high and distant from the center of the castle, but instead, she found out, they were literally above the Great Hall, overlooking the gardens of the Goblin Castle. 

Hoggle explained it simply: "Wasn't his choice. Tradition, that's why. King's room is always near, so folks can get to it quick if they need him." 

Still, it would have taken a second trip through the Labyrinth, Sarah suspected, to get to Jareth's room if you didn't know the way. Hoggle ducked down a few back rooms, before leading her into what appeared to be a study. In the corner, behind a sliding panel, was a spiral stair.

She looked at it questioningly and the dwarf averted his eyes. "Ifs there's lady friends over," he muttered. He looked back over his shoulder at her as he scrambled up the steps. "Wasn't built by Jareth, though."

Images of women moving up and down the steps as if through a revolving door passed through Sarah's brain, but she forced them away and followed Hoggle upwards. 

The little stair opened up into a small anteroom, which led in turn to a spacious bedroom. Some instinct made her hesitate as the dwarf charged ahead of her into the room, opening the curtains further, to let in more light.

_His room_. It felt as though she really was invading his privacy, even though he'd told Hoggle to take her here. 

It was simply decorated—heavy, carved wooden furniture, including a giant canopied bed; floor-length curtains; a few chairs and a table in front of an enormous fireplace, carved all over with goblins. She moved toward the chairs, undoing her cloak and draping it carefully over one of them. In the nearby corner was some sort of modeling stand, with a silver-embroidered black cloak swinging from the shoulders of the figure, and a wall-length mirror behind it.

_Figures_. She snorted, turning away. Hoggle caught her looking and his bushy eyebrows rose, but he didn't comment. "That door over there's to 'is clothes-room, I don't recommend you go there or you ain't ever gonna get out," he said instead, gesturing with one large hand to the opposite wall. "And that's 'is wash-room. Over there, that'll take ya to the hall."

"What other rooms are nearby?" she asked, glancing over her shoulder at the alcoves looking over the Labyrinth.

"Well, cross the ways is another one of 'is closets, and a room for the games, and down the hall's where the Queens stay."

"The Queens?"

Hoggle nodded slowly. "Tradition, ya know. Nobody stays there now. His mum don't even stay there now, when she visits,' cause she's not the Goblin Queen."

"I see," Sarah mumbled, more than slightly bored by the etiquette of bedroom placement. "What's this about a game room?" She imagined the rec center at her university. _Goblins or frat boys—it'd be hard to say which would be more destructive._

"Oh, sometimes there'll be comp'ny over—maybe his kind, maybe goblins—and they visits there. Sometimes Jareth lets us use that." Hoggle pointed to a velvet-draped object set near the bed.

She wandered over to it, curious, and tugged the drape off before Hoggle could stop her. _If he didn't want me to do anything, he wouldn't have made that comment,_ she rationalized. Besides, she thought, it wasn't as if it were a scandalous discovery; it was simply an enormous crystal ball, set on a claw-footed pedestal of gold. 

"What does it do?" She could see herself in the crystal—it seemed ordinary enough, although maybe it took Jareth's presence to make it do whatever it was meant to do.

Hoggle shuffled over by her. "He uses it like he uses his other ones—he can see whatever he wants." He frowned and glanced over at her. "And he lets us see sometimes—some of them things you see in your box in your room."

"Television?" she gasped. "This is a _television?_" 

"Dunno what it's called," the dwarf shrugged. "But Jareth, he likes to see what other folk do. Like your folk." Hoggle waved at the crystal again. "And when the goblins'll be here, he'll shove it in the other room and let the goblins look in on it, and sees all sorts of stories to keep 'em still."

"Hmm." _Well, good thing he didn't get to keep Toby, then, if his idea of taking care of the goblins is to let a glorified television babysit them._ _Well, at least it isn't the Internet._ The globe seemed to pulse, as if objecting. Sarah chose to ignore it. Instead, she peered closer at the image inside.

"Hey, it's not reflecting! Hoggle, look!"

It wasn't reflecting. The image was the same as when she first looked into it, true, but she'd been mistaken then. The globe wasn't showing her face, wasn't acting as a mirror. Instead, within the room was a scene of Jareth's quarters, with a dark-haired young woman and a dwarf peering into the crystal ball.

"It's watching _us!_"

Hoggle looked nauseated. "Probably just a trick of his, knowing ya would peek." He tossed the drape back over the crystal. "Don't think no more about it."

_He's hiding something, but what is it? _She bit her lip and slanted a glance over at the dwarf. Hoggle appeared so ill that she chose not to push him on it—no need to distress him.

"Maybe you should get some rest," he was saying, edging toward the door.

"No! I am tired of being sent to bed! Why does everyone keep wanting me to go to bed, anyway?" She flinched. _I know what Jareth would have said if he were here. _

Hoggle looked at her in confusion, then returned his gaze to his foot, scuffing the carpet. "But you was hurt…"

"I don't even know how or why! You're acting like my head got knocked in, and for all I know I fell on the stairs and just got a bump for it!" 

The dwarf peeked up over at her again. "You sure—you don't know nothin' about how you was hurt?"

"No, God, I wish I did. Then I could get the hell out of here." She shivered as she surveyed her surroundings. _This is like waiting for a spider in his web, for pete's sake._ "I shouldn't be here. We don't know what happened—for all I know it was an accident—I mean, God, it was New Year's…" Her voice trailed off.

_New Year's and I was drinking at the party. I woke up with a bitch of a hangover, so that memory is right. So what did I do? I was at Ben's party. I went out back. Allan was grousing about Meredith. _Allan. She swallowed, suddenly feeling as nauseous as Hoggle had appeared moments ago. _I was going to kiss him at midnight, and then I was thinking about—oh, God, no…_She thought frantically. It was insane. She couldn't have. He wouldn't have, not Allan. But how could she know for sure? Her heart slammed furiously against her chest as her previously vague anxieties now took on a horrible shape in her head. She had to be just panicking. _That's it, I am just nervous and overwrought and jumping to conclusions. I mean, come on, like I really would've gone to bed with Allan, for God's sake. _She swallowed again, already doubting herself. What to do? She couldn't inspect her clothing, since she no longer had it, thanks to whomever. Her body had been cleaned by the time she'd awakened first in the Queen's Castle—she didn't look like a ratty-haired hangover victim, at least. And her body felt so miserable all over…all over…that….She gulped again. _Oh, come on, weren't you supposed to be able to tell? _

"But I don't know!" she whispered to herself.

"Sarah?" She jumped as the dwarf's hand patted her forearm sympathetically. "You all right? I'm supposed to get ya anything ya want."

_A ticket home and a doctor's appointment would do the trick_, she thought, digging her nails into her legs so that her hands wouldn't shake.

"No, Hoggle," she managed finally. "I think I'll just wait here for him."

"Fine, fine, I'll check on ya later then."

Hoggle shuffled out of the door and Sarah, too unnerved by her worries to investigate Jareth's bedroom as she had the other, looked around for a place to sit. Finally, unable to sit anywhere that wouldn't remind her of Jareth, she walked over to the window seat, extending one leg across it while one hung down the side.

She was in this position, looking out over the Labyrinth and trying desperately to relax, when she felt a shimmer in the air.

"Quite an appropriate spot."

She jerked around and saw Jareth leaning against his bed-post, watching her. His voice broke the silence again. "You look as if you belonged there."

"I belong home." She rose to face him. "Look, do you have any idea what is going on yet?" 

His expression was blank as he approached her, stopping a mere foot away to regard her out of the corner of his eye. "No, I do not."

"Did your mother know anything? I had to get in her castle _somehow_."

Jareth's mouth tightened. "I haven't spoken with her to discover that. I'm told she is visiting my father and his wife."

"Your father and his wife?"

His serious expression briefly melted away as he laughed. "You may think me a bastard, Sarah, but I assure you, I was the child of a legitimate union." He chuckled. "They simply chose not to maintain the union."

"Divorce?" _Jareth's got a stepmother? Jareth?!_

He shrugged lightly. "I suppose it would be called that. Regardless, she is not here now for me to ask her about your situation."

"But what if this was just a dumb accident or something? I'd be sticking around here for no reason!" She flung her hands out in a gesture of desperation, willing him to tell her it really all was just a silly accident and not the dark result of her own stupidity. 

His shoulders moved again in a gesture of dismissal as he moved over to another window and settled himself on the seat. "Lovely view, isn't it? I've spent many an hour being charmed by this spot."

_Great, we're back to an evening with The Riddler_. She sighed in exasperation, then bit her lip. Could she ask him about her suspicions? He seemed to be able to tell these things. And it could be connected with her mysterious arrival in the Queen's Castle, if something had happened with Allan…He'd have to know that eventually…

His eye caught hers. "Yes?"

Now she began to stammer; there was no way she could get through this easily. "Jareth…" His eyebrow flew up at the obvious appeal in her voice. She looked away. "When you—you examined me, you said I had only been hit on my head…"

"Yes," he answered immediately, decisively. "Sarah, what is it? Have you found injury elsewhere?"

"Noo…" She twisted her skirt with her hands. "I was wondering—well, you said, um, nobody had, uh, touched me other than to hit my head…"

He frowned and rose as if to walk to her, but she shied back. "Yes, I did. What is it, Sarah? No-one took advantage of you, I made absolutely certain of that."

She trained her eyes on the carpet. Her voice was a whisper. "Are you sure—well, could there have been anything voluntary? If you know what I mean?"

A grave could not have been quieter, or a more frightening place to be, than that moment. It took an agonizing minute before she heard him speak, his voice devastatingly devoid of emotion. "No. That would not have been possible. I would have known." 

"Oh, thank God." Unable to help herself, she sat down in the chair and scrubbed some relieved tears from her face. The relief, however, came with an enormous, guilt-ridden price, and she couldn't turn around to face that just yet. "Look, I'm sorry," she heard herself whisper. "I was unhappy, I was drinking, and I didn't know if—if—I _had_ to ask, Jareth, I didn't know--"

"I understand." But his voice remained distant as a desert, and just as lifeless. 

His boots echoed on the floor behind her as he walked away. 

_He's the king of all flirts, God knows he doesn't exactly make me feel secure. So why am I feeling so horrible? I haven't done anything! To him, or with anybody else, for that matter. Thank God._

She finally made herself rotate in the chair to look over at him. He stood facing a simple sketch hung on the wall, his proud back to her. He had his hands clasped in the small of his back, fisted, and his legs planted wide, as if for a military salute. Every line of his body was controlled and tight, but also wrong, like a mistuned violin.

"Jareth—" she began, before he spun around to face her.

"For the extent of your tenure here, you shall respect my rules."

"What?" She stared at him, open-mouthed.

He strode up to her and she could see his eyes snapping with some dark emotion. "You will behave respectfully to me before my staff, at all times. I was regrettably lenient with you last time, Sarah; I will not be so again. Strike me at your most dire peril," he hissed, leaning down to her face. 

She jumped back from the white-hot rage she saw there. "Then why don't you send me home?" _This is all his fault, anyway. If he hadn't been such a jerk, I wouldn't have gotten wasted, and I'd at least remember last night. _" And you were the one falling all over Karen!"

He slashed a hand in the air and the windows slammed shut. His eyes held hers as he stormed closer. "I will send you home when I please. For now, that is all you need know. And as for your beloved stepmother, child, I have already given you my explanation. If I had wanted to seduce the creature, I assure you, I could do a much better job than that hackneyed performance," he spat. 

"But—"

"You insult me yet again. Have you no idea how difficult it was to pretend any favorable interest in the vile being who makes you suffer, woman? The Underground knows why I let you stay here, to make _me_ suffer!" he thundered, slamming a hand on the table. He growled and suddenly was upon her, bringing her forcefully into his arms and bared a cruel, angry smile at her. "You are here at _my_ pleasure, woman, and there you will stay." She kept her palms braced against his chest in her shock and could not respond. There was no time, anyway: he had disappeared but a second afterwards, leaving her standing alone and bewildered in the midst of the King's chambers.

* * * 


	12. Sweet Necessity

The dwarf was nearly bowled over by the figure of the Goblin King, striding forcefully down the hallway towards his study. One glance at the King's face told Hoggle, in sickening clarity, what had happened. 

Not that the King was at all unclear otherwise about his state of mind. The door of the study slammed with such force a painting in the hall fell right on top of a passing goblin. "OUT!" he roared, and a flurry of goblin servants came scurrying out of the study. One of them frowned fearfully at Hoggle and shook his head urgently. "Don't get near that one! Him's in a mood to kill!"

No one would dare to disturb the King in such a mood. Hoggle, of course, was hardly going to break from common wisdom now and go charging in to see Jareth at his worst. But he knew the Queen would be in a state as bad as her son's if he didn't get some answers for her. So he clenched his jaw and slid against the wall to the dreaded door, which had bounced off the doorframe when the King had slammed it, and thus was left cracked open—just open enough for a dwarf to peer in.

* * * 

It was dark in the study—the curtains had not been fully opened and with the sun not yet on that side of the castle, the room had the gloomy, dust-mottled aspect of a house left shut-up for years. In one muted beam of light, however, the seat of the king was visible, as was the silhouette of the man in it. He was sitting with one boot braced against the top edge of the desk, the other left sprawling out before him. One arm hung carelessly over the arm of the chair, while the fingers of his other hand were tapping his tightly pressed lips relentlessly. 

"I should kill him," the dwarf heard the King's voice slice through the air into the stillness. His free hand lifted up, a crystal now twirling on the finger-tips. Various faces flickered in it, all young men dressed in the baggy sweaters and light shirts Sarah always wore Aboveground. The King's voice sounded raw, uneven, and strained, as if he had been shouting for a very long time—but that was not possible, Hoggle thought, frowning; the King had just been to see Sarah for less than five minutes. 

His voice came to Hoggle's ear again, rough and hoarse. "So which one would it have been? Or were you not one of her insipid little schoolfellows? Her unthreatening fool _boys?_" His lip curled in a snarl and in a sudden movement, he hurled the crystal into the wall, where it exploded into a shower of glass shards. The King's eyes slid shut, his face hidden behind his hand in the darkness, and Hoggle crept away.

* * * 

She sat alone in the King's quarters for a good half-hour before a goblin popped his head in to inform her that her own room was ready. In that time before she followed him down the hall, she'd had a good deal of opportunity to go over her previous conversation.

_Lovely. I've pissed off the Goblin King yet again. Am I not having the luckiest year or what?_ She snorted and rubbed her forehead. _And now he's so angry he all but said I'm his prisoner here. _Her skin crawled with a brief, horribly delicious, vision of what sort of prisoner she'd be. She blocked out the skin-warming image of Jareth and handcuffs desperately; this wasn't for pleasure, she reminded herself. _So now it's not some supposed effort to make sure I'm safe, but just imprisonment because he wants to show me who's boss. _

_ And to make sure I don't have sex with the nearest human guy, I guess_, her brain added reproachfully, and she laughed with bitterness to herself. "The irony is, I'd have been doing it just to stop thinking about him."

The little goblin came for her then, drawing her eagerly down the hall to another bedroom, this one a replica of Jareth's but done in a feminine style. She was in no mood to appreciate her surroundings, however; she hurled herself angrily on the bed and promptly let loose her frustrated tears. And tried desperately to forget what had made her weep in the first place, when he had turned away from her.

* * * 

"Geddoff," mumbled the goblin as Hoggle hauled him down the hallway. "I'll do it for 'im, no need to rip me fur out." 

"Hurry up, or I'll be ripping your neck out," hissed the dwarf, anxiously glancing at the time. It was a terrible plan, but he had the feeling immediate, if pathetic, intervention was required.

They came to a halt in front of the King's door, Hoggle stopping so quickly that the goblin in tow promptly fell to the floor with a surprised squeak. He glared and the goblin staggered back upright. 

"Evenin', Pip," he grumbled loudly, hoping he didn't sound too damn cheery.

The goblin looked briefly confused, as if he'd forgotten his own name, before nodding eagerly. "Right, EVENING, Boss! Good EVENING!"

Hoggle winced and glanced to the ceiling before resuming. "Have you heard anything o' Sarah? You worked in that wing, don't ya? I went to her room but it was locked—I hears she didn't come out _all day_." He spoke with an awkward slowness, as if he were declaiming to a room full of goblins, but if it made his voice clear enough for a listener in the next room, that's all that mattered.

The goblin frantically gestured, obviously forgetting his line, so Hoggle groaned in silence and scrubbed his eyes pointedly. "OH, RIGHT! I means, RIGHT, right, Boss. I been up there. No, that one, she's been cryin' all day." Hoggle made a lifting motion with his hands and the goblin, dimly comprehending his point, raised his volume significantly. "CRYING HER EYES OUT, I saw it myself. It's a wonder they didn't roll right out."

"Oh, no!" Hoggle knew his exclamation was completely unbelievable but characterization was beyond him at this point. "What'd she be cryin' about? I thought she was so HAPPY to be visitin' here, you know, to see the Goblin King…She seemed right excited this morning…"

"Dunno," answered the goblin enthusiastically. _Pip likes this too much,_ Hoggle grumbled to himself—before they knew it, he'd be trying to crash the Underground theater troupe and then the Gods help them all. "She said somethin'…" He scratched his nose in confusion and Hoggle kicked him to get his attention, then drew a heart in the air with his fingers. The goblin 's expression was blank at first, and then shocked. "You means she might be sweet on HIM? After he took—ow!" 

Hoggle ignored the goblin's glare and the paw he rubbed against his shin. _Serves him right, little bugger_. "That's what I guessed, after what you heard her saying!"

The goblin grunted. "Oh, YEAH, she said she was afraid of him but he ain't lovin' her like she wants." He grinned triumphantly at the close of his lines.

The dwarf sighed._ Fool couldn't get it right, but close enoughs, I thinks. _

Part of the plan or not, he couldn't help but leap aside as the door flew open and the black-clad figure of the King stood there, studying them both severely. "This kingdom is a disaster enough without a king who cannot work. For what reason are you two plaguing me?" 

The little goblin piped up as Hoggle knew he would. "Oh, time for din, Majesty."

He nodded and started to head down the hall, towards the dining room, when he spun back around to them. "Hoggle!"

"Yer Majesty?"

He spun away again before the dwarf could see his face. "See to it Sarah is brought down immediately for dinner."

* * * 

_Damn it, they're as obnoxious as alarm clocks. How does Jareth stand them? _ Sarah's brain was groaning as two goblins mercilessly dragged the bedding off of her. She'd cried herself to a deep sleep and, from the looks of the sky through her windows, she'd spent most of the day in that dreamless sleep.

"No damn peaches, at least," she mumbled under her breath, but then rethought her comment—it probably would have been better to have had another peach-induced dream of Jareth, when he was at least happy with her and not threatening to keep her prisoner forever. Yes, that was much nicer than her current reality.

Grumbling, she allowed the goblins to pull her from the bed and accepted the clothing they pointed out between giggles. Anything was better than the rumpled old ball-gown, which only reminded her horribly of how it felt to be locked in Jareth's arms, against his ravishing lips.

She tried not to notice the goblins as she grabbed the outfit and headed for the bathroom to change. _Yeah, that's really family-friendly, Sarah, getting turned on right in front of the goblins. What kind of sick person am I? _

The outfit was a simple dress, obviously well-made but not excessively lavish, thankfully comfortable (no corset required, she was glad to see) and warm. She wriggled into it without difficulty and followed Pip and Gip downstairs.

_Not exactly the same as my kitchen, that's for sure. _The dining hall was about the size of the auditorium on her campus, with a giant, horse-shoe shaped table placed before a slightly raised dais. 

She gulped and dared to peek under her lashes at the figure who rose from his seat at the dais table at her entry. He had changed to a more casual outfit of white shirt and gray breeches, but the effect was the same as if he had been wearing full-length black: a storm about to break. Two thoughts burst into her brain at the sight of him:

_Damn, he's fine._

_ Damn, he's pissed_.

Well, what was she expecting? Him to rush down there and hug her enthusiastically? _No, but it'd be great if he'd do something else enthusiastically…Williams! Get your mind together. _She bit her lip. At least he was going to give her food—with the extent to which she'd ticked him off, he could have stuffed her in an oubliette. 

The goblins halted, apparently surveying the table for a spot for her. A dark-haired man at the end of the table jumped to his feet, flashing a charming smile at her. He bore an unfortunate resemblance to Colin Farrell, she noted.

"That gorgeous creature may sit here." He slid the chair next to him out and Sarah hesitated before his outstretched hand. She glanced up to the dais, frowning to see it suddenly empty, but before she could take in what that meant, a cool leather hand encircled her wrist.

"Sarah sits with me," that familiar yet always exotic voice snapped. 

She glanced up tremulously at him, but he was looking at the dark-haired man, not her. The Colin Farrell look-a-like's face registered very un-Colin Farrell fear; he nodded and said, so quickly Sarah could barely hear him, "Of course, of course, I apologize for the misunderstanding, Your Majesty."

The Goblin King registered the apology with a curt nod of dismissal, taking them both away from the dark-haired man before he even resumed his seat. Sarah was aware of the sudden silence in the room; she was hardly an expert on noble behavior in the Underground, but she gathered reigning kings did not generally go about acting as ushers on a regular basis.

He didn't speak to her, however, either as he marched her to the dais, as he pulled her chair for her, or even after he took his own. Instead, he was quiet throughout the meal, watching his guests (other than herself) and occasionally speaking to them (but not to herself.) Even though he clearly was still angry with her, a part of her sulked at his silence. 

_Grrrrreat. So I'm obviously his little pet still, but still I'm in the doghouse. Great. _She glanced over at him periodically but he never turned his head to look back. Her thoughts filled the silence between them.

_Why won't he talk to me? He's just beating his fingertips on the table. You'd think he was into the drums or something from the way he's always tapping away. Or maybe he's got ADD or whatever and he can't stay still. Oh, hell, why do I care? What the hell is wrong with me? _

Her eye caught that of a blond woman down the table who was licking her lips and admiring Jareth with a smoky, come-hither gaze. Sarah nearly gasped aloud. _The ho! _Granted, she had no relationship with Jareth, and God knows she didn't want one, but the blond woman didn't know that, and it was completely tacky of that wench to be salivating over him in public. _Bitch._ Sarah gritted her teeth. Jareth, she noted from the corner of her eye, was oblivious to the fact he was the choice dish for that woman. Actually, she thought, surveying the table, for most of the women—most of them were attempting to give him flirty looks, but other than a reflexive smirk here and there, he was ignoring them. _Thank God. I'd have to dump this plate on his lap if he started licking his glass at the tramps._

She flicked a glance over at him again. _No more drumming, I guess. Now he's bopping his leg. Oh, dear God, those pants don't hide those quads. Those legs are like works of art. And never mind the rest, oh, God…_

_Quit looking at him, Williams! What the hell is wrong with me? Jesus! Did he see me? Oh, thank God. DON'T LOOK AT HIS THIGH! And God, do NOT stare at THAT. Jesus, I'm the prisoner of this moody creep. I'm not supposed to be sneaking looks at him. _

She sighed.

_But I am._

She forced herself finally to train her eyes on her plate and let herself doze off, since nobody was talking to her. And certainly not the lord of lust next to her.

It was thirty minutes into dinner before she heard his low voice murmuring to her: 

"Eat your dinner."

She jumped and some of the potatoes slid out onto the tablecloth. She tried to scrape them back subtly and, of course, ended up smearing them still further into the cloth, leading her to emit a very unladylike curse. Blood-red, she turned her face back to her plate and hissed back out of the side of her mouth, "I'm not that hungry."

"I said, eat your dinner, girl." It was like ventriloquism: he faced his subjects and his lips barely moved, but his voice still drifted to her.

_How is he always so damn good at everything? _ "Why don't you eat yours and quit worrying about mine?"

He touched his long-abandoned fork and she could swear one-third of the plate's contents disappeared just after her taunting line. "I have eaten more than you, and if I choose not to eat more, it is because I don't care for the meat, not that I am sulking like a child."

"Yeah, that's why you've been pushing corn around on your plate for the last fifteen minutes! And don't think I didn't see you just get rid of some of your food, like you'd eaten it! Toby does that, for pete's sake. What, is Ambrosius lurking under the table with a full belly now?"

Now the regal golden head swiveled to regard her, the eyebrow arched. "At least he, Madame, eats. He is in no danger of starving himself to death out of spite."

"Spite? I already told you, I'm not hungry!" She sat back, folding her arms with determination.

His eyebrow arched again. "Perhaps you require a more appetizing meal?" He raised a hand gracefully and her food transformed into a giant peach.

"Oh, like that wasn't predictable," Sarah snorted. He grinned slowly. _Well, at least he's smiling, even if it is just over tormenting me. _

"Perhaps, but what about this?" And with a shimmer, the peach was topped with a swirl of whipped cream. As she stared at it, a spoon appeared before her eyes with a slice of peach and cream on it. Her eyes shifted along the stem of the spoon, to the gloved hand holding it, to the wicked, dancing eyes on the other side. 

"Don't tempt me into making this a piece of cake, love," he said, smirking.

She started to stick her tongue out, but the edge of the spoon was suddenly sitting on her lower lip, slipping forward between her parted lips. "Always so contrary, aren't you?" His voice was distinctly amused. She glared at him, was rewarded with a twitch of his cheek, and then reluctantly opened her mouth. 

She really wanted to hate it. She really wanted to hate him for putting her through this ridiculous, childish display. Unfortunately, being fed cream and fruit by the sexiest man she could even imagine, let alone meet, didn't rank terribly high on the United Nations' list of known tortures. 

So she closed her eyes, allowed the cool cream to slip slowly about her tongue, permitted herself to curve her tongue beneath the scoop of the spoon before it retreated, let herself lap juice delicately from her lips and savor it, and swallowed with deliberation. But better than the chill of the spoon against her tongue, beyond the sweetness of the peach and the cool of the cream in her mouth, was the scent of Jareth, leather, spice, magic, and man. _And just as nummy, _her brain supplied above the bliss experienced by her senses. "Mmmmmmmmm….."

A metallic clatter made her eyes spring open. Horrified thoughts suddenly flared in her mind. _Oh, God, did I just sound like Meg Ryan in "When Harry Met Sally?"? Is he disgusted with me for letting myself get carried away? He gives out dances in peaches, not turn-ons!_ _Oh, my God!_ She glanced at their neighbors—who didn't appear shocked, thank God, by any hormonal responses to the dessert—and finally over at Jareth.

If he was horrified, he didn't appear to her paranoid eye to be so. His face, suddenly but an inch from hers, had gone whiter than its normal porcelain shade, and the pupils of both eyes were startlingly large, pools of darkness. Beneath them, his mouth had opened slightly, and she could hear his breathing, rough and short. His lips seemed very, very close to her…

"Sarah," he breathed. A hand brushed the side of her face gently and she blinked. His eyes were so intense—as dizzying as when she'd said goodbye to him that first time in the Labyrinth…Her hands clutched the tablecloth to steady herself.

"Jareth?" she heard herself whisper.

She thought she had fainted for a moment—but no, there really was a swirl of gray and white in front of her as he shot to his feet and vanished in a spiraling column of glitter.

* * *

The dwarf's room in the castle was dark, small, and warm thanks to the fire glowing softly in the fireplace. He had been ordered to move into the castle to assist Sarah during her stay and though he missed his home, life in the castle had its good points. Including a winter without the huge bills of heating. In sleep, his face mashed into his pillow, Hoggle grumbled in memory of years past.

It was the third or fourth time that his name was called when he finally responded, lifting his head groggily from the bed. "Whaadda? Who's there? Sarah?"

No, it wasn't Sarah. It was worse, the Queen, or at least, her image in the crystal ball she'd left in his care.

"Goodness, I thought you'd never awaken," she commented, but her tone was not as light as it normally was with him. The dwarf groaned inside—she must have heard.

"Hoggle, what is going on? Tell me at once. I just looked in on Jareth and the poor boy is in a state, and you know I cannot endure that. What is happening in the Goblin Castle?"

What, indeed. He sighed and gulped a bit of the ale he'd left on the nightstand. The entire castle, actually, wanted to know what was going on. It had seemed promising, that first night she was here—Hoggle had been slightly alarmed at first by the appearance of the peach, but the subsequent exchange between the two didn't seem hostile; Sarah even seemed to right enjoy it, actually. And to Hoggle's astonishment and joy, it had appeared as if the King might kiss her, then and there. He'd certainly been praying; he of course wanted Sarah to be happy, but he also knew his life depended on Jareth being in a pleasant mood when he discovered how Sarah had received that bump on her head.

But then, instead of stealing the kiss, the King of Goblins had abruptly disappeared from the girl's side. Since then, he'd barely been sighted anywhere in the vicinity of Sarah, limiting their time together to silent dinners in the public dining hall. _Scared again of saying he fancies her, _the dwarf thought.

Sullenly, the dwarf adjusted his night shirt to ensure his decency, flipped the ball of his night-cap out of his face, and lifted the crystal in his hands. "Dunno, Yer Majesty. We got here and he was started actin' all jealous-like and nasty, and then theys fought, Sarah said."

"No!" she said again, slapping her hand against the arm of her chair. "How can this go awry? I put her in the same hall with him, dressed appropriately for a romantic engagement, left them alone—and you say they've only been quarreling again? What could have happened this time?" 

"Sarah said somethin' like she maybe kissed some boy at home, 'fore we got her."

The Queen gave a growl of frustration rather like her son's. "Silly child! She always was far too quick to say precisely what was on her mind." She waved a hand as Hoggle began to open his mouth. "Now, now, Hoggle dear, let's not argue over defending her. Tell me this, I can well imagine what he's thinking, but what of her?"

The dwarf shrugged. "She's bored and wants to go home. She feels bad, that he's mad at her."

"How bad?" The Queen's eyes lit. "Has she admitted she's in love with him yet?"

"Nah, nah, but she's always watchin' him at dinner. An' he's peekin' at her, too." Hoggle chose not to inform the Queen that the Lord of Carondan had fallen very ill immediately after the dinner at which he'd tried to give Sarah the seat next to him.

The Queen beamed. "I have trained you well, my dear boy!" She sighed. "They sound perfectly adorable." He grunted, not sure if the murderous silence that hung over the two was quite "adorable" or not. She ignored him and paced in the ball for a few moments before spinning back to him. "Hoggle, my darling, we have been concentrating on the wrong side just now. He is ready; now we need to work on her. I want you to fetch me the goblin ladies, and when they are ready, you shall give them this. I cannot have them losing it." In his palm a fat peach materialized. "No, no, don't protest, my dear! If she's thinking of him, as I know she is, she will find the temptation irresistible."

"And then what? They're as liable to sulk at each other at a party as at dinner here, I thinks."

She shook her head and laughed lightly. "No, Hoggle, this won't take her to a ball again." She smiled. "It will only make her…more inclined to pursue any wishes she might have. She worries too much about consequences; we shall solve that little problem."

Hoggle stared at the peach as if a maggot would crawl out and attack his hand at that very moment. "I dunno, Yer Majesty…"

The Queen gave him a frosty look. "If she harbors no feelings towards my son, she will have nothing to act on, will she, my dear? You need fear no harm to her, nor any magical changing of her mind. Anything she does or says will be of her own free will, I assure you." She sighed again. "This is clearly a women's situation. Fetch me the goblin ladies, Hoggle!"

* * *

"I'm in a freakin' fairytale castle. You'd think there'd be more to do. Why don't they mention things like this in the stories?" 

In her room, Sarah was idly walking by the row of cathedral windows overlooking yet another fantastic, maze-like garden, with the Labyrinth curling beyond them. Every window in the castle seemed to have a gorgeous view; at first, she stopped and gaped at every window, but the beauty quickly became dull to her eye. There was only so much interest in a rose, magical or non, after all. 

That's the way it really was with everything in the castle, she decided. After a few days of being virtually ignored by its king, she lacked a favorable impression of the place. Beautiful, but dull and lifeless, with no company but her own to enjoy it all. The library was enormous but there was no one with whom to discuss the books. A few magazines from the Aboveground appeared in her room, but Hoggle hardly appreciated her triumphant laugh at J-Lo's break-up with Ben Affleck, and the goblin maids who looked after her tried but didn't understand. ("Witchy, is she? Like that princess of the orcs who was after all the kings, 'cludin' ours.") She could play with the kitchen cat and the dogs who wandered the castle, all theoretically strays but well known to be the indulged pets of the Goblin King. She was a city girl with not even a pastel-green thumb, so the royal gardens were merely beautiful for her, not a hobby. And there was no one, really, with whom she could go walking there. The Fae men of the court avoided her, and the women stared at her suspiciously from afar. 

"I need to go home," she groused to the goblin maids as they entered her room. She threw the book she'd had on her lap down on the floor; it landed with a satisfying thump. "I'm actually considering doing schoolwork. That says something, doesn't it?"

The goblin women shrugged and scurried around the room. The larger one, with whiter hair, spoke up---Sarah tested her memory; yes, this one was called Magda. "Dearie, you ain't gonna have to do much of that here, I'm thinking."

"No, the King wants you to be fixin' your head on something else," sniggered her sister, Lippie. Sarah groaned and tried to ignore the snickering. Goblin humor had a tendency to the bawdy, she'd found out early on.

"I just wish he'd let me go home already! I don't see why he's keeping me here!"

Lippie shoved her away from the blankets and took Sarah's spot opposite Magda, tucking in the sheets. "Girlie, we all knows that."

She threw herself irritably in the chair as the goblin maids continued their work. "Oh, please. He's got me in the silent ward, for God's sake. I'm the castle social leper, apparently."

Lippie chortled and beat a paw into the pillow to plump it up. "He's got you in here, and that's sayin' something."

"I know why he brought me to—"

"No, _here, _I said. These rooms, the Queens' rooms. His girls might come 'round, but they never stay here. Sign of 'spect, this is." 

She rubbed her face tiredly. "Whatever. I just wish he'd let me go! I wish I knew what to say to get me out of here."

Magda glanced over her broad shoulder at her. "You ain't sayin' you don't know how to get somethin' from a man, are you? At your age, girlie?" Lippie joined Magda in a salacious guffaw at her expense.

Sarah gaped at them. "_Excuse me? _Did you just mean—" and she fell silent, shocked, as Lippie's hand motion indicated that she and Magda meant absolutely what Sarah thought they meant. 

The goblins was unphazed by her shocked reaction. "Give him what he's wantin' and he'll give you yers." Magda giggled to herself, and her partner glared at her before looking back at Sarah. "Works with me hubby all the time, dearie." Lippie nodded eagerly at Magda's advice, winking at Sarah as she wiggled with her arms to lift her chest higher, and Sarah continued to gape at them.

"I'm sorry," she stammered finally. "I guess I'm just tired and not hearing properly. I think I had better take a nap."

"Course, get a bits of shut-eye for him," Lippie agreed. Magda peered at the tray by the bed, however, and frowned at Sarah. "Best eat your peachie now, though, or you'll spoil your appetite for sup and then he'll be sore as can be."

_As if he can get madder than when I've seen him_, Sarah snorted. Then she blinked. _Eating to not spoil one's appetite? _For a moment, she stared suspiciously at the peach, then shrugged. It was the Underground; logic had no reason here. And as for the peach, they were all over the castle; she shouldn't be surprised. And she'd had others here that weren't enchanted. _Unless you call hormonal overload thanks to being spoon-fed one by a hot Goblin King enchantment…Arrgh!_

Smacking her foreheard lightly, she picked up the peach and began to nibble gently on its sweet flesh.

"That's a good girl, miss…"

She was dimly aware of the maids slipping out of the room quietly as she flopped onto the newly made bed, staring up at the ceiling.

_How do I get out of here_, she thought for the millionth time, examining the paintings in the ceiling. They were of lovers, she realized with a blush, and rather graphic. She hated to think what paintings were in the King's rooms if this was how they saw fit to decorate the Queen's. _They're probably all done in images of Jareth, for God's sake._

She bit her tongue as her brain wickedly superimposed Jareth's face on the man's in the painting above her. She shook her head lightly. How to get out of here…

_Give him what he's wantin' and he'll give you yers.._

A slow warmth began to build in her center and spread outward, like a heated liquid poured into her from above. She could hear her pulse ringing in her ears as it sped up.

_This is impossible. _

But what if it worked?

_I can't believe I'm actually considering this._

But somehow, in the lulling warmth of her room, the contented sigh she heard escaping her own lips, it seemed not just possible, but easy…very easy…and God, so sweet…

The wonderful, silken warmth of his bare chest beneath her hands.__

_ …Every pleasure shall be yours…_

The firm and tender motions of his lips on hers; the sweet invasion of his tongue.

_ …Asks him…_

The sweet, spicy scent rising from his skin. 

_ …As you wish…_

His naked body in the moonlight.

_I would have killed them_.

His lips brushing her hair.

She licked her suddenly dry lips, catching the last of the peach juice, as the idea finally seized her.

There was one way to convince Jareth to let her go. 

If he thought he could get her back.

There was one possible answer to her problem, something she could do to remedy her situation. And it had the possibility of being the most enjoyable desperation strategy in history.

Seduce Jareth.

* * *


	13. The Sex Appeal of Libraries

Even as giddy as she was under the influence of the peach, a certain part of Sarah's reason had not been put to rest. That part of her muttered that the idea was insane, that using physical attraction to manipulate Jareth was akin to a twelve-year-old trying to outsing Pavarotti. Another part of her brain, however, also piped up.__

_ You're in a freakin' Goblin Castle and held virtual prisoner by a very well-formed man who wears spandex and leather_, another part of her brain reminded her. _Do we need to worry about what's really insane?_

She brushed her hair rapidly and checked out her image in the mirror. _Not bad, not bad. _It was from what she mentally called "the Sarah Underground collection," meaning all attire simple, plainly cut, practical, and generally modest, all of which set it apart from Fae wear. She bit her lip, regarding herself.Could this be tempting enough for him? She couldn't throw on some obvious "romance me" number because it was midday and it would appear just a wee bit too desperate and obvious if she showed up in plunging décolletage. Any perfumes or added jewelry would lead to the same conclusion. Better to keep with the virginal maiden look, than. _Not exactly an unknown role for yours truly, anyway…_

Sarah headed out into the hallway. In the past few days, she'd figured out some parts of the castle, but by no means all. Instead, what she knew was that if you wanted something done, you had to acknowledge that the castle servants knew far more about it than most of its privileged occupants. She flagged down a passing goblin and asked for the King.

"E's in his libbary, princess," the goblin chirped, and trooped on. He scurried off before she could correct him.

_The library, then. Hmm. _At least she knew how to get there, thank goodness. Or at least, to the main library—for all she knew, Jareth might have some secret library of his own.

And in fact, that was the case—she poked her head into the library in the heart of the castle, but there was no golden-haired Goblin King at any of the tables there. Thus she had to grab yet another goblin, who sighed impatiently until he saw her face, then grabbed her hand and dragged her off another hallway.

_God, I hope Jareth's there, because there is no way I'll find my way back by myself_. She kept close to the little goblin, aware of how dark this particular hallway was becoming. At the end, suddenly, she saw a slight beam of light. 

"That's 'is place," the goblin told her. "G'luck to you, missy, as he ain't in the best a moods today."

_Who'd have thought the light at the end of the tunnel would be Jareth? _She thought to herself with a giggle as she tip-toed forward.

She lost her giggles as her hand fell on the door-knob. "Here we go, feet," she muttered to herself, and pushed the door inward.

It swung into a small and oddly shaped corner room, with the ubiquitous gardens outside the ubiquitous wall of windows. _Is there a windowless room in this place? _She shook her head and glanced around. The room was half-lit, thanks to the shifts of the afternoon sun. 

"I gave you access to a library of a million books. Why am I not surprised yet another gift of mine was not enough for you, Sarah Williams?"

She gave a little shriek and whirled around, nearly smashing her face into Jareth's shoulder. He was standing behind her, arms folded casually, in an outfit of blue and black. Very thin black, she couldn't help but note, dragging her eyes from the inner curve of his thigh muscle.

"Sneaking about my castle yet again, Sarah?"

_Damnit! _She jumped and felt absurd.Why had she forgotten how nervous he made her? It was one thing to try to manipulate a boy in class with a crush on her; the other to try to control the Goblin King's hand. Why did she feel like she had lost already before she'd even tried?

She blushed—it was not necessary to fake it, so maybe the terror Jareth caused instantly on some level of her body was a good thing—and scooted back automatically. She smiled, and at least her shyness wasn't in the slightest forced. Butterflies _were _savaging her innards, after all, at the very idea of coming on to anybody, let alone to _this _man. "You scared me."

Up went the eyebrow. "Astute as always." He walked past her and dropped into a stuffed chair; she saw a book had been in his hand, but he dropped it on the seat next to him as he watched her. "May I inquire what brings about this little visit? Lost, are we?" His hand waved and a map appeared in his hand. "Take this and it will guide you back to your chambers."

"I'm not lost," she blurted out. 

The map vanished and a crystal rolled in his palm instead as he regarded her. "Oh?" 

She looked down. _Damn, this is harder than I thought_. Her cheeks were already burning and her palms had begun to sweat. "I wanted to see you."

"Really." The chair creaked as he shifted to lean his head into his hand, watching her. 

She flicked a glance at him up from beneath her lashes. His expression was unreadable. She edged back to an aisle of books, allowed her hand to run idly over the volumes. "I was bored."

"And the King of the Goblins is sufficient as a means to put off your ennui? How you do flatter, my lady." His tone was cool again, his eyes glittering slits.

She smiled quickly at him and batted a hand in his direction. "Stop it. I missed your obnoxious presence, okay?" 

"Perhaps." _Ahh, here we go._ He smirked dangerously and rose, a snake rising from a charmer's basket. She fought the urge to bolt as he took a few strides her way, swinging one boot before the other, each circling movement of a leg tightening the coil in her stomach further.

_Okay, so he's listening, what then? _She couldn't think. She retreated farther down the aisle; he paused, leaning against the shelves with an amused glint in his eye. "You're still mad at me, then."

He raised his eyebrow and cocked his head. "Angry with you? Oh, never, love."

She pulled a book from the shelf, ran her thumb over the rough gold-embossed cover, and then gave him a sideways glance, biting her lip nervously. "You live to tease me, don't you?"

His smile was sinister. "If there is anything I am not, love, it is a tease."

He stepped closer and she edged back, sliding a foot around the back of the bookcase, putting her hand against the case's frame. It was cold against her flushed skin. "I'm trying to end this, you know. The fighting."

He had frowned at the first comment, but his face slowly lit with the second. "Really," he purred. He took an ambling step to the bookcase on the right, but a step that advanced him to her nonetheless. His smirk grew as she ducked back again. "Is that an _apology_, precious?"

She gritted her teeth and rolled her eyes. _Jackass_. "You're determined to make this hard on me, aren't you?"

"Of course not." Warm breath and a soft voice caressed her right ear, causing her to jump around and collide with the body slightly behind her. Jareth smiled at her, leaning against the rear of the bookshelves, as she inhaled quickly and froze. With his free hand, he reached out and traced her cheekbone before she could draw away. "Now, love, care to clarify what this is all about?"

"I told you." She backed up, reddening under his inquisitive gaze. "I hate this fighting. I can't even eat, for God's sakes, sitting there knowing you're furious with me. And I can't sleep, either." She glanced away from him, unable to watch as his smirking expression dissolved into something more intense, more concerned. "It's all so stupid, anyhow. I only—only asked about what happened to me because I'd been drinking…and…." She caught a book's edge with her finger, stared at it— "I was afraid—I was afraid I might have done something—and thought---thought it was you—because I wanted it to be…you," she finished in a rush. Scarlet, she slipped back around into the aisle, finally glancing back when she was halfway down it.

He was watching her with the strangest look on his face, a small smile as if he couldn't quite understand her words. He tilted his head, lips slightly curved—_God, they look soft_, she couldn't help thinking—while his eyes bored into hers, making her feel somewhat ashamed, as if he'd just walked in on her undressed. _That thought sure isn't helping_. Her upper body tightened and she could feel her chest painfully as she crossed her arms defensively, backing up. "Wanted it to be me," he repeated quietly, not once looking away.

"Oh, stop." She blushed further and backed up. Her pulse was hammering and her lower body was turning to lava beneath his gaze. She needed space. "I didn't tell you so you could rub it in my face." She grabbed a book and exited the aisle, heading over to a table, as if to sit down and read there.

"Sarah." 

She wheeled around, clutching the book to her chest. "Yes?"

He approached with the same slow, stalking movements of a jungle cat; she could see the muscles rippling beneath the fabric that covered his body, but worse, she could see the hungry glint in his eye and the menacing little smile beneath it. "I'm afraid I don't have this quite clear, love…" She stepped around the edge of the table; he followed. "That unfortunate night, the man you were thinking of was…me." She stepped away as he moved forward again with another long stride. "And just now, you confessed that what you had been missing was…me." She had been rounding the corner of the table, heading toward the exit, when his arm shot out and held her with a light but unbreakable grip. She emitted a surprised yelp as he stepped before her; she slid backwards, bumping into the table. He had approached her so rapidly that she didn't have time to move; she was backed up against the library table and powerless to resist when he drew the book deliberately away from her, tossing it on a stuffed chair without taking his eyes from hers. "_Passion's Pleasures _yet again, my dear?" What cologne did he wear? It made a girl faint to stand so near to him, fighting the urge to nuzzle him, to drink up the scent of his bare skin with nose and hands and lips and tongue…She managed only a slight whimper in response to his question. His smile deepened as he leaned over her, bracing his hands on the table by either side of her hips. Just a little bit lower, she was acutely aware, and he could kiss her. Would kiss her, she realized, from the way his eyes traced her lips and then rose to her eyes with an approving light. Her lips suddenly felt like sandpaper and her tongue darted out before she could stop herself. His own mouth curved teasingly. "I always knew you were a woman of discerning taste, Sarah."

She had put her hands on his chest to stop his approach, but rather than holding them still or removing them, she allowed her fingers to spread against his shirt, index fingers even finding the skin of his neckline. It seemed strange, to find her frightening, cold, porcelain-skinned Goblin King a creature of heated blood and velvet-hard muscle beneath his attire, a wild being leaning into the press of her hands, the stroke of her fingertips, as he gazed down at her…She lightly traced the inner curve of his pectoral muscle, mesmerized, before a motion of the skin made her jerk her eyes upward._ Is he trembling? _She looked up into the dark expression on his face, swallowing roughly at what lay there. Her own body shook involuntarily now, her hands catching his shirt to steady herself. She didn't know what she should say, only, in that splintering moment, what she had to say. "I missed you since Christmas. I've been thinking about you since then," she finished in a whisper. It was true, although it was also true she was becoming panicked at how near he was, and the look on his face.

She glanced up at his face and for a second hesitated—he was looking at her with the same wonder a man might have before his newborn child. "What are you saying, Sarah?"

She hadn't the slightest clue. Suddenly, her brain only wanted to throw aside this mad plan of winning, and using, his affections, and get the hell away from—from this, whatever it was. She smiled nervously and edged back. "I don't suppose saying I think you're cute will satisfy you."

He laughed and his hair brushed her face as he shook his head. "No, because I'm much more than cute." He smirked at her, purring now; the sound of his voice released a flood of warmth in her center. She heard his silken whisper as his eyes locked onto hers. "So you think me handsome, my Sarah?" 

She had used the moment of his laughter to slip past his arms and move around the table. His mouth curved devilishly. "Suddenly so shy, little Sarah…" He began to walk around the table methodically; she laughed nervously and backed up further. The grin he gave her in turn promised all the wickedness in the world. _Oh, my God_….Forget mush; her knees were liquid and all that business in health class about having a skeletal system was an absolute lie. _Run! _She turned and glanced around the library frantically. That was all the time it took; she shrieked as she felt arms wrapping about her.

"Oh, no, dear, you're not going anywhere," he murmured into her ear. Rivers of heat surged through her, summoned by his voice; you could've plunged her into the warmest Jacuzzi and it would not have felt as good as the heat of his voice just then. "Not a step without me, love." She gasped as she felt his burning lips move over her neck, nibbling on her collarbone. 

For a few seconds, all she could do was lean into him and whimper at his ministrations. This wasn't quite the escape plan she'd imagined, but then again, she knew she wasn't going to walk out of this particular lion's den unscathed. 

She spun around in his arms, breathing rapidly as she met his hungry gaze. There was only the sound of their breathing in the room as she studied the vulnerability of his face, the beauty of the eyes opened wide and focused pleadingly on hers, causing her heart to slowly flip over in her chest.

_Crap_. Well, she wasn't the best at seduction games, it would seem. 

There was nothing else to do. 

She shoved a hand into the golden mane at the back of his neck, rose up, and kissed the Goblin King.

* * *

In the movies, grand romantic moments _look _like grand romantic moments—the camera spins around the couple, blurring a bemused world from the moment of their joy, some power-diva love song is heard, balloons are released "accidentally" into a brilliant blue sky that can only be achieved in Hollywood Technicolor.

If someone had been watching Jareth and Sarah, this might not have seemed to be the moment as expected. 

It began promisingly, the girl's arms sliding around the Goblin King's head, bringing her face upwards in a sweet embrace. The girl had just started to retreat shyly from his lips, tearstains on her cheeks, when the Goblin King pulled her against him forcefully, locking her body against his. His lips, however, were light, offering her slow kisses that barely brushed her face and lips as his hands moved up from her hips to cradle her head. One would have noted their mouths opening in the next kiss, and seen a new mood coming upon the couple. Her hands were wandering over his chest, pulling his shirt untucked; his mouth was ravishing hers. With a slight grunt, his hands caught the backs of her thighs and propelled her upwards onto the table behind them. Their lips were still entwined, so there was no discussion as he placed a knee on the table and followed her on it, kneeling over her like a jungle cat devouring its prey.

At this point, one would have suspected a movie that wasn't quite a romantic-comedy was on tap. Not, one would guess from the pants and moans emitted by both of them, that either Jareth or Sarah would have particularly minded at this point.

But, still, theirs was a compromising position to be sure, with the Goblin King, High Prince of the Underground himself, sprawled over the mortal woman on a table, their lips and tongues wrapped up in each other, her hands under his shirt, wandering over his chest, and one of his hands just then cupping the back of her thigh as the other hand held his weight above her. 

And while the Goblin King and the girl apparently were quite fine with the situation—delighted with it, one might say—to an observer, it certainly wasn't the expected scene.

And certainly not for the man who stood in the doorway.

"Son!"

* * *


	14. Redhanded

You had to give it to Jareth: Even caught as he was in a supremely undignified position, his trademark self-confidence did not waver for a moment.

His head had snapped up from her neck, causing her very skin to howl in protest as cool air replaced his warm lips. His face, she saw as she looked up at him, was as stony as one of Medusa's victims. One unwelcoming word fell from his lips: "Father." As he looked up and spoke, his hand jerked her skirt straight on her thigh where the motion of their—her brain winced—_makeout session_—had driven it upwards. Sarah knew only her ankles would be visible to the person in the doorway, but Jareth evidently wasn't taking chances. In the next moment, he'd slid off the table both quickly and casually, and before Sarah could gasp, he was drawing her off the table with the nonchalance of assisting a lady out of her side-saddle. She studied his face as he helped her down, but his guarded eyes were not on her. 

"Father," he repeated again. Sarah noticed with a small twitch of pride that he was still having some problems steadying his breathing. 

Nonetheless, there was no embarrassment on his face as he stood, arms guardedly crossed, to greet the person at the door. She was not so fortunate; she knew her skin was blood-red by now and she scratched her arm desperately, futilely, wishing the scene to be just a really bad dream. _Great, first his mother catches me in his bed, and now his father walks in on us en route to the act_. _It's a wonder half the Underground doesn't think I'm having his baby by now_. _Although, for a taste of that—Stop it, Williams! _ She bit her lip and moved slightly closer to Jareth, turning to regard the visitor rather than listen further to her troublesome hormones.

He regarded her as curiously as she did him. Although Jareth favored his mother more than his father, there was enough of him in this man's build to mark them clearly as father and son. Even the mocking eye that darted back and forth between the Goblin King and herself was highly reminiscent of Jareth's taunting gaze. 

He smiled over at his son and she sucked in a breath of recognition. _Damn, there is more than one of them_. "Ahhh, my son, this does bring back memories. Do you recall when I came upon you in the stables—or was that when you were tupping that lass beneath the billiards—"

"_Father_," Jareth ground out viciously. _What the hell? _ She stared at him in surprise. His obvious fury at the interruption wasn't startling—her angry body reminded her that his sentiments were shared in that regard—but the note of near hatred in his low voice threw her. 

Instinctively responding to Jareth's hostility, she gripped his shirtsleeve as the older man's gaze shifted to her. "Ahhh, yes, I am forgetting my manners entirely, thank you, son. My lovely lady, you _are_ an exquisite one, I must say. Fortune smiles upon my rascal offspring once again, I see, although she is hardly the only lady to think well of him!" The King's blue eyes twinkled merrily and he winked. "Now, what name makes this rose sweet? Jareth, aren't you going to introduce me to your charming lady friend?" He strode forward as if to take her hand, but Jareth's gloved hand was suddenly around hers. 

He ignored his father's question. "What brings you to my castle, Father?" 

"Ahhh, Jareth, always so quick to get to business." The High King inclined his head to Sarah. "You are a mortal, are you not? Otherwise you would know me, my dear—I am the High King of the Underground and the sire of this villain."

"Don't take too much credit," Jareth responded coldly. "What are you doing here, Father?"

He chuckled and winked again at Sarah, to her surprise. "Always so irritable when he's distracted from a lady's charms! Although I can't say I blame him in this case." His hand went up as Jareth drew in an angry breath next to her. "Now, now, son, no need to be so inhospitable. Elana and I are just visiting on a little pleasure trip."

"What of your wife?" Jareth's jaw clenched.

"Marianna is back at my castle, of course." 

The eyebrows went up. "You left her with Mother?"

The King laughed out loud, a booming, free laugh. "Of course not! Why should your mother be at my castle?"

She felt his hand involuntarily tighten around hers. "Mother was not with you? You didn't send for her?"

"No, of course not!" laughed the King again. "I think I have enough problems with women without bringing her back into it!" He sauntered over and leaned against the table by them; Jareth, she saw, slitted his eyes but otherwise refused to move from his position. "So what is it, son? Have you gone and lost her now? She is probably off visiting the shops of Rivendale—first of year clearance and all—you know how women are." His eyes drifted between herself and Jareth again.

Jareth shifted against the table so that he was facing his father, putting his back to her and blocking her effectively from the conversation. "Don't tempt me, Father. You and Elana may take up your rooms as you like, but I have urgent business to handle now. Kingdoms are rather difficult, you know," he growled. "I bid you goodnight, sir." Without saying a word to Sarah, he strode so rapidly to the door that she nearly had to run to keep up with the firm grip on her wrist. 

"Pity," she heard the King say behind them. "I would have liked to talk more with your enchanting young friend."

Jareth said nothing, but she heard the doors to the library slam far behind them.

* * *

Strangely, he seemed not to have a plan as they left the library. He jerked to a stop in the Great Hall, his breaths coming in angry pants for a minute or two, and seemed to be lost in thought. Still without speaking, he spun and led her through the back, to the private stairs up to his chambers.

Dr. Phil would have a field day with this family, she thought, daring to peek over at Jareth as he almost ran down the castle halls. _This is so bizarre_. She ought to curse Jareth's father—her brain complained that he'd just majorly complicated her plans of sweet-talking Jareth into releasing her, while her body bitterly resented his interruption of their activities—but now she was simply too curious to do so. And anxious, she admitted, for sake of the Goblin King. The peach's effects had faded, but something else remained, and the world was changed. Had Jareth been dragging her to his bedroom in the mood he'd been in just before his father appeared, she would have been extremely worried for herself. Now, however, with him so clearly aggravated by his father's visit, she knew she was perfectly safe in his presence—but oddly, she felt worse than if he had been at the peak of his lusty, seductive charms; she felt strangely powerless and bewildered before the frown on his forehead, the anger in his jaw, the worry in his eyes.

He released her when they entered the room and he paced around silently, an angry caged animal. She sat down on one of the chairs, watching him for a minute before she hazarded a question. "What's going on? What do you think has happened? Do you think there's something wrong with your mom?"

He sprawled in the chair opposite her, watching her thoughtfully. "No. I would have known if anything had happened to her." He tapped the pendant hanging around his neck, exposed by his unbuttoned shirt. "I am trying to decipher for what reason she hasn't clarified her whereabouts for me."

He continued to look at her, through her really, as if somehow the answer was written on her face. Unnerved, she blurted out the first thought in her head: "Who is Marianna? And Elana?"

His eyes focused again as they met hers. "Marianna is my father's current wife." He rubbed his temple wearily, his mouth tightening. "And Elana is his current mistress." 

"Oh." _Like father, like son, then—can't keep away from women. Or maybe the opposite is true, too_, she thought, watching him rub his closed eyes, noting how his unbuttoned, untucked shirt hung away from his chest. She curled her fingers inward, shoving aside the desire to touch him. _God, he is beautiful_. Her body warmed at the memory of his eyes as he crawled onto the table, over her, the unspeakable delight of his body against hers. His quiet sigh distracted her, however, and she ventured hesitantly, "Is that why you don't get along? Did he—I mean, was that part of the reason your parents split up?"

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Curious little Pandora tonight, aren't you?"

"Sorry." She blushed. _Idiot. As if he'd just tell you anything personal_. 

The corner of his mouth curved slightly. "No matter. To answer your question, I have never interrogated either of them in-depth about their separation, but I knew at the time that he was not faithful and I knew as well she was not happy with him."

"That must have been hard," she ventured.

He shrugged, looking away. "It was meant to be. They did not belong together. She thought him to be a much more substantial man than he is, and he was incapable of living up to that standard. It is unfortunately an old story."

"Oh."

He returned his eyes to hers. "You have already noted, I am sure, that women intrigue him." Jareth's mouth twisted bitterly. "Avoid him. Call me if need be. I do not want you subject to any situations you might find…distasteful."

She gasped. "You don't think he'd—"

A leather-clad hand waved in the air. "No, he doesn't force himself on women. But he has sufficient disregard for others that he could foreseeably make an advance on you that you would find unwelcome." His mouth became a straight line again. "And I will not tolerate that."

This was her chance. _Finally, an opening. _She leaned forward slightly, digging her fingers into the chair to steady her hands. "If you are worried about that, Jareth, you could send me home."

His jewel-like eyes had been directed to the fireplace; now they snapped back to her. "Never."

"_Never?" _

He gestured dismissively again. "I would never expose you to risk solely for the purpose of avoiding confronting my parent's wretched behavior."

"But we don't know that I _am_ at risk! If someone was using me to get to you, something would have happened by now, wouldn't it? Something to me or someone else? And the other option is that I was rescued from some incident or accident back in my world, so it's not as though I'd be in some kind of danger of repetition if I went back." She walked over to him and knelt beside the chair before he could move, putting her hand on his knee and leaning forward to look him directly in the eye. "Please, Jareth, I need to go home." She allowed herself a strategic indulgence--she moved her fingers against the hard curves of muscle beneath the thin material of his breeches. 

He caught his breath, staring down at her. Then he shook his head and twisted his head to the side. "We have been over this, Sarah." 

There it was again, that weird, shimmering sense that he was hiding something from her once more. She frowned and rose. _If I push it now, he's just going to get suspicious and then angry_. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him get to his feet, too. 

"Sarah…" 

She evaded the hands that attempted to encircle her waist. "Well, I should be retiring…"

He smiled suddenly and if he was tired, if he was worried, if he had any problem in the world other than bedding her, he certainly did not look it. "Indeed, you should," he purred.

"In my room, I mean," she stammered, backing up further.

He inclined his head towards the great bed and its canopy. "There are always other options, you know, love." 

She ducked his lowering head. "And we've gone over that already, Jareth."

She heard him mutter a curse before he looked again into her eyes. "You are quite the changeable sprite, Sarah…" His eyebrow quirked. "I thought it might be…pleasant…to pick up where we'd left off…" He slid closer. "As I recall, I had been treated to a most enjoyable goodnight gesture and I hadn't time to reciprocate the gift, I fear."

"Oh, don't worry." She jumped back. "You know I'm not greedy when it comes to your gifts."

Irritation flashed in his eyes for a moment. "Unwise, Sarah, that was unwise."

_Shit_. She was in the process of undoing all the groundwork she'd laid towards his trust. She made herself take a slow step towards him, allowing his arms to enfold her and bring her close; she left her palms against his chest as a barrier (and to savor the velvet hardness beneath them) and stared at her skin against his. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be rude."

"May I apologize now?" he murmured into her ear, and a rain of quick, searing kisses showered across her jawline. 

At the last moment, she twisted her face away. _Let him kiss you on the mouth and it's over. You might as well just worry about how much birth control is on hand now_. "Please…"

His eyebrows were both up now. His voice was sharper, not quite as flirtatious as before. "Why so shy now, love?"

_Think, Williams, think!_ "It's…ahhh…I'm not exactly used to this, Jareth. I don't want to rush into anything just because—well, you know what happens." His grin was smug; he was going to speak but she slipped a hand over his lips, to his obvious amusement. "I'm trying to be a bit more…agreeable…but I'm still not going to just rush into your bed because—well, because of how it is when we kiss."

He purred slightly, resting his forehead against hers. "Spectacular, you mean?"

She grinned despite herself. "You know what I mean."

"Indeed I do," he said, lifting his head from hers reluctantly. She felt his lips brush her forehead gently. "So allow me to escort you to your chambers now, love. We will…_discuss_…this more tomorrow." He gave her a smile of such wicked promise that clothing abruptly seemed the most horrible burden on earth. She followed him out of his bedroom and down the hall to hers. "Until then, I shall grant you the space you wish."

"Oh, thank—" she began, but she was cut off by the unexpected assault of his mouth on hers, his tongue taking full advantage of the fact her mouth had been open when their lips first met. Stunned, she lacked the time to respond before he pulled back, eyes twinkling merrily. 

"I didn't say when I'd start." He winked. "May you sleep well, lovely one." His hand closed briefly over her fist as he suddenly kissed her lightly on the cheek. Just as she gasped in surprise, a shower of glitter took Jareth's place in front of her, leaving her alone in the hall, breathless and flushed, and now clutching, she saw, another rose. 

She groaned and yanked open the door of the bedroom in frustration. She glanced down at the rose in her hand as she kicked the door back into place behind her. "Why does he have to be so damn wonderful?"

* * * 


	15. Unfortunate Blows

The dwarf shrugged wildly. "Dunno, Majesty." 

She slammed the heel of her hand into her palm impatiently. "Unacceptable. Hoggle_, what is going on_?"

He wished he could say. Insanity? Madness? A world gone crazy? The world of the Labyrinth was infamously illogical, but as far as he could tell, this uncertainty took Underground madness to a new level. 

It had begun, as best he could tell, with the arrival of the High King and his mistress. Apparently imagining himself to be Hoggle's partner in crime, the goblin Pip had barreled into the dwarf in the gardens, yapping something about Jareth's dad. Stitching together the goblin's shrieks, Hoggle realized the High King had swept into the castle, gone looking for his son, encountered him in his private library, and what happened there, nobody knew, but Jareth had emerged in a rage, escorting a breathless Sarah away with him. 

An hour or so later, Pip himself had walked past the Goblin King's study and had heard a royal argument therein. "Our Majesty, he was sayin' that his dad oughtta keep way from our girl. He says—"—the goblin had furrowed his brow, sweat beading on his forehead as he struggled to remember the words—"—he says, 'You ain't kept no promises to me, Pops, but keep this, don't you go near her.' " Hoggle privately doubted Jareth's words were quite as the goblin recalled, but nodded, accepting the general gist of Pip's report. "And his dad asked why he was so sore 'bout her, cause he don't normally worry so much about his girls, or was our King just hot 'cause of him comin' here so sudden. And our King said ain't his business, but his dad is always sayin' our King don't talk to him, and if he wanted to ever talks to him, he had to keep his paws off Miss Sar, 'cause he wouldn't have no one scarin' her 'way." Pip had lowered his voice conspiratorially, hopping up and down a bit with suppressed excitement. "And _then_, the big King asked ours if he was gonna marry our girl, from the way our king was talking, and His Majesty said—"—Pip's claw gripped Hoggle's arm painfully for emphasis—"—he said, _he wasn't gonna say."_ And the goblin had leaned back triumphantly as Hoggle groaned inside with disappointment.

So what did he have to tell the Queen? That Jareth was sensitive about his father trying to woo Sarah? Nothing very shocking there. Hoggle scratched his chin. There was the matter of Jareth and Sarah's behavior, too. Sarah still acted shy and nervous around the High Prince, as best Hoggle could tell, but Jareth…Well, the High Prince had been acting in a way nobody could figure out. For one, he smiled much too much lately. Then there was the way he shadowed her. He had always been protective of Sarah, but unlike her first few days in the Castle, Jareth had practically dogged her every step of late. The goblins had known from her arrival that anything she wanted was to be given her; now, they knew that they had better do a damn good job of figuring out what she wanted before she even asked, even if she never asked, as far as the Goblin King was concerned. Every night, Magda had told him, her maids were to have steaming bubble baths waiting for her, topped with rose petals. Didymus and Ambrosius had arrived in the Castle to escort the girl for walks when Hoggle was not available, and the dwarf himself was just an alternate for Sarah's expected escort, the King himself. It wasn't just as his walking partner that one saw the Goblin King with the girl. Jareth doted on her publicly; if one watched them at dinner, they would see, as Hoggle did, the King teasing her and playing magic tricks on her food and utensils each evening, saying things that made her cheeks go pink and caused her to swat him periodically. And whenever he had time away from his duties, the staff knew to look for the Goblin King in the company of the Aboveground girl, whether it was playing games in his study, reading in the libraries, watching the realm in the King's Crystal, or skidding about the snowy Labyrinth in the royal troika. It was the conclusion of the goblins, and Hoggle too, that the King was besotted with the girl as never before, but they'd always known he was wildly fascinated by the kind-hearted mortal girl, even before she came back. There was one question therefore that hung out in the air, unanswered, and Hoggle could no more give the Queen an answer as he could give himself:

What did Sarah feel?

* * *

There was a tongue in her mouth, and it was not her own. That was the first thought Sarah had as she drifted into consciousness. It was not the worst way to wake up, granted. The tongue was warm, and velvety, and gentle in teasing hers to return the invitation to play. In fact, this sweet invasion was just the sort of prompting one might need for the greatest kind of dreams; her lower body was already simmering in anticipation for them. But, stimulating or not, it was most definitely a shocking replacement to an alarm clock, and so Sarah's stunned eyes flew open, her body tensing despite the heated relaxation the mouth on her own had elicited so masterfully.

Her eyes met a mismatched set of pupils, gleaming with good humor; she became distinctly aware of the agonizing maleness of the skin against hers. _Oh, my---_"Mmmpphhh—damn it!" She snapped her mouth shut, but Jareth had been a second ahead of her; her teeth closed on her own tongue, not his. 

She'd closed her eyes in pain but she felt his fingers against her chin nonetheless. "May I be of assistance? I've heard of an Aboveground custom, this 'kiss and make it better'…" He leaned in again but she shoved him back irritably.

"Jareth! What the hell are you _doing?_"

She scrubbed his eyes and now could gather the state of affairs in her room. The Goblin King, resplendent in navy today, was sitting by her hip on her bed, leaning over her with a naughty glint in his eye as he watched her. _Of course, he _had_ to come when my hair is a rat's nest, I have morning breath, and I look like the hag from hell_. She shuddered inwardly, recalling Toby's creative array of insults for her general morning "look."

"Love, what is this on your chin?" she heard Jareth asking curiously, his thumb rubbing her skin lightly.

_Oh, God!_ She shrieked instinctively and dove under the bed covers, earning a rumbling laugh of surprise from the Goblin King, but she was too horrified to care. God _damn_ him! Why did this happen to her? Not that she wanted him to be seduced by her morning appearance, but she _did _have a modicum of pride, damn it, and she didn't want her mailman, let alone a sexy Goblin King, coming upon her when she'd been using toothpaste to clear up a bit of acne over night. _God, not like these freaks know anything about skin problems, they're too freakin' perfect. Note to self: Severe damage to self-esteem will result when one is hanging around with immortal perfection too much._

"Sarah? What is the matter?" Jareth was still laughing, tugging very lightly on the covers in an implied threat to rip them off her head.

"Shut up! I'm not going to answer questions about how I look when I didn't invite you in here, to begin with!" she growled.

"But I came to wake you up, my enchanting lady," he murmured, chuckling. "And I did have other options for waking you—as I recall, your literature had the romantic hero waking the young lady with a much more…pleasurable…greeting…"

She flushed, cursing herself for her innocence, and scowled as he gently pried the fabric from her fingers, drawing it down from her face. "Now, love, don't be cross. I've brought your breakfast, to sate the beast inside." He traced her lips with a finger, smirking as she bared her teeth warningly. "I want to go riding today. Horses, although…" He laughed as she did gnash her teeth at his finger

"I don't know how. Not everyone is born in a castle, you know," she muttered sulkingly. 

"We'll make up for your barbarity," he said, pulling her upright. 

"Why, you arrogant jack—"

A raucous female voice interrupted her. "Mornin', Lady Sar—oooooooooooooooohhhh, Yer Majesty!" 

"Majesty? Him's—ooooooohhhh, 'lo there, Sire! We didn't know—"

Sarah glared at Magda and Lippie, bobbing curtsies and almost falling over in the doorway. She mouthed a word behind Jareth's shoulder: _Traitors_. The goblin women ignored her, blushing and giggling. Jareth looked amused, apparently unaware that he was the reason they were near to fainting where they stood. "It's no problem at all, ladies. I was simply stopping by to bring your lovely mistress her breakfast. Have her ready to go riding with me in an hour, won't you?" He rose, smirking at Sarah before he turned back to the goblin maids; he walked to them, bowing to their ears to say in a mock-whisper, "She's quite cantankerous in the morning, I warn you. Best fetch that vile caffinated drink she so adores."

"Don't we know it," Magda muttered back while Sarah gritted her teeth in annoyance. Lippie was quiet, too busy standing behind Jareth and staring raptly at his rear end to join in the commentary. The King nearly stepped on her as he turned around—_serves her right, _Sarah thought irritably—but Lippie jumped around his swirling cape, gave her a saucy grin and a thumbs-up without the slightest evidence of chagrin or shame. _Not that I can completely blame her_…Sarah ground her teeth further and wanted to smack herself for the umpteenth time. It was just because the bastard had given her an unpleasant wake-up arousal that she was already co-signing the goblin maids' lecherous looks at him. Just part of his plans to get her in the sheets, obviously, and she was playing right into it. She sighed forlornly as he blew her a mocking kiss and slid out the doorway. _But it was so much fun to play_…

* * *

"Aughhhhh, how did this happen?" she asked herself minutes later, having shuffled grumpily to the shower and cranked the water up to scalding.

She'd asked herself that question several times in the past few days, and still had no answer. She grabbed the shampoo and frowned, thinking back to the day after she met Jareth's father…_and, er, Jareth's library table…_She gulped and brought her wicked mind to heel, savagely soaping up her hair. _Of course it has to be a peach-scented shampoo. Of course. Damn him_. She'd awoken the next day with a raging headache, as if she'd a hangover, in fact, but she had no idea why. Nor had she any clue why the night prior it had seemed like such a great idea to encourage Jareth's attentions. Well, a good, _safe_ idea, that is, she amended silently. But still, regardless of her bewilderment over what had happened in her head—be it the onset of PMS, a captive's syndrome, or some hormonally-induced madness—she knew she had gotten herself into quite a fix. The Goblin King was, thanks to her, currently under the impression that his amorous gestures were welcomed. Not only had she utterly failed to convince him to send her home, she'd all but invited him to crash her bed any time he liked. _Brilliant as ever, Williams_, she groaned to herself, remembering. 

So she had tried to extricate herself from her perilous position as gently as possible, to avoid Jareth slamming her into an oubliette for leading him on. Not the most outgoing with men to begin with—as Karen had reminded her nastily more times that she cared to recall—she gave free reign now to her inner shyness, edging back from Jareth, making it clear to him that proximity unnerved her. As she predicted, he reciprocated by being very careful in the way in which he approached her—generally slow enough and obvious enough that she could evade his attentions. To balance her physical retreat from the infamous Night of the Library Incident (which she refused to mention to him), she allowed him to joke and tease with her, to re-establish friendly banter between them. Actually, she admitted to herself, grabbing a loofah and scrubbing her elbow, this was more than the friendly banter of before. Jareth was acting…almost _happy_, if that was the right word, with her. It was rather like when he'd first appeared in her apartment after they kissed at the Christmas ball, completely confident that she wanted him as much as he wanted her…Sarah groaned aloud.

_Well, it's not like he doesn't have reason to think that way_, a subversive side of her brain pointed out traitorously; guilt stung her. It was worse than when he was in her apartment, actually, because he was being so…well, there was no other word for it but _nice_. He wasn't always trying to get his hands under her skirt (although he never ceased to make comments indicating he would enjoy that possibility)—instead, he'd seemed to be trying pretty damn hard to make sure she was having a good time at the castle. He took her to do all sorts of things—he was teaching her the politics and history of the Underground; he'd had her join him in the Goblin court, so she could hear and see how justice was executed under his reign. He showed her his private art galleries, although she hadn't seen any of his own work yet. He was forever asking her about her life, her thoughts, and she had yet to get over the surprise that she could be so fascinating to someone, let alone to a man with the devil's own charm. God, he'd even allowed her to gather the goblins to watch "Survivor," and although he'd snorted and made pointed comments about how magic would definitely give him an edge over those fool mortals, he had encouraged her to show him her favorite programs. He'd even prompted certain people at the castle to socialize with her, although thank God, his father wasn't one of them. She'd only caught sight of the High King at dinner, where he and his floozy, whatever her name was, were seated too far from Jareth for a conversation to occur, and occasionally at a distance about the castle grounds. He never approached her, although he did seem to recognize her—he'd bow with the charming mockery his son possessed in spades, and flash a smile from afar before whoever was with her at the time would hustle her away.

But for all that life in the Underground had become more pleasant, it was still life in the Underground, she reminded herself, rubbing a peach-seed scrub into her skin. She'd utterly failed at convincing Jareth to send her home. Smiling at him and allowing him certain liberties like holding her hand would get her certain boons—he'd reluctantly had her schoolbooks delivered, and allowed her to look into the King's Crystal to check in on her seminars to keep up-to-date with her academic work—but it hadn't moved him a centimeter closer to releasing her. In fact, other than her schoolwork, and the good company of Jareth, all that being sweet to him had scored for her was a sort of public notoriety as the King's prospective bedwarmer. She saw the nobles eyeing her, the way the men tended to steer clear of her or speak to her as if she were some sort of asexual nun type. She saw what was happening with the lower classes, too. It wasn't hard to guess why Magda and Lippie had taken to bringing out dinner dresses that had increasingly plunging necklines—less the Sarah Underground collection than the Jareth's Erotic Dream collection, she snorted to herself. _But he does give them food and board, so I guess I can't blame them too much_, she sighed. Still, it was annoying to be sold out by her maids, even if she couldn't blame them for wanting to score points with their employer. Something inside of her just balked horribly at the idea of being served up to the Goblin King like a present, with no will in the matter of her own. 

She shoved the vision of Jareth and wrapping paper aside and returned to shaving her legs. She could see so many little ways people tried to curry favor with him through her. It was pretty clear to her that the staff was ganging up against her, she thought, washing the conditioner out of her hair. If she went into any room by herself, chances were whichever goblin was meant to keep an eye on her would disappear and one golden-haired Goblin King would return in his place. God help her if she set foot in the conservatory or gardens when the moon was out and nobody out—she'd actually seen a stampede of goblins running down the hallway by the gardens, no doubt to report to him that she was available for a romantic moment, and there were suddenly vases by every doorway with red roses, as if to keep his weapon of choice handy wherever he might go.

"Shit," Sarah swore lightly, dropping the soap and groping at it with irritation. It wasn't just the damn soap that irritated her. It was _him_. He was just so…well, he made her want to believe so very much what all those little looks and pointed silences implied, the little smile on his face when he sat before her on the floor on the castle's new TV night and had tugged her skirt mischievously for her attention. She wanted to believe what she felt when he had reached across in the moonlight gardens and tucked a hair tenderly behind her ears. 

She bit her lip to bring herself back to reality and away from thoughts that made her eyes sting. "Be sensible, Sarah. This isn't a fairytale." 

* * * 

The dwarf peered out from the castle's balcony at the grounds below, watching goblins dash out of the way as a white stallion came thundering up. A flock of panicked birds shot out of a nearby tree's empty branches, swirling in the sky like a dark omen.

"Wish he wouldn't do that," Hoggle muttered to himself, stomping his feet a little for warmth.

He'd been waiting to catch them together for hours now. The maids had tipped him off that the King had whisked Sarah off in order to ride horseback—_oh, yeah, she's sure ridin'_, Hoggle snorted to himself, staring down at the scene below. The King rode astride but had Sarah perched before him in the way the high ladies often rode, with their legs and skirts to the side. Sarah looked mildly uncomfortable, but that could've been because of the dark-gloved hand resting on her stomach, not a fear of falling. The King's face registered no such discomfort—his skin was flushed from the cold wind's snap and his eyes, even from a distance, shone joyfully. The dwarf grunted, watching as the white horse pranced restlessly across the snow-covered courtyard, cooling down, or steaming down, rather, in the frozen winter air. Had he ever seen Jareth look so happy? _Like he gots rid of all them fairies once and for all…_

"He is very taken with her, isn't he?" A soft female voice jarred him from his thoughts.

For a second, he thought it was Her Majesty and his hand tightened anxiously on the little crystal in his hand. A quick glance, however, told him that was not the case. It was her ladyship Elana, the young lass who was the High King's companion. Hoggle felt a pulse of sympathy for her—she was barely older than Sarah, in Fae terms, but twice as romantic. And unfortunately for her, the High King was not one for deep, meaningful gestures of affection. If he could even feel deep affection, Hoggle grunted to himself. He glanced back to the courtyard, hearing a ringing laugh from Sarah and the deeper harmony of the King's laughter. At least with Jareth, moody rat that he was, you could tell whom he liked or disliked strongly. 

"Guess they's friends," he finally responded to Elana.

She nodded and regarded the scene wistfully. "I suppose so. I do hope it all works out for them. I'm sure His Majesty would love to have a wedding."

The dwarf touched the bracelet at his hip thoughtfully. He knew Elana meant the High King, but his own mind was elsewhere when he responded, "Yep, yep, I'm sure he would."

* * *

"God! Watch out!" Sarah ducked within Jareth's arms.

He laughed and leaned into her as they sailed beneath the long, snow-drenched branch of a tree guarding the way to the stables. "I believe this is the first time I've seen your courage fail you, Sarah."

"It's about—ahh!!" She clutched the arm fastened securely about her waist instinctively as they rounded a corner at a romping canter. She could swear his damn horse was doing all this just to scare her right off his back. She'd seen the way the critter had been eyeballing her before Jareth swung her up on the horse's back in front of himself. 

The Goblin King laughed, a rich and musical sound that floated in the air behind them as they floated onwards over the flying snow. "About what, pray tell?"

She glared up at him over her shoulder. "About common sense, that's what. You can be as nutty as you like, but some of us actually, you know, _die_ and little things like that."

He looked down at her, the teasing smile on his face softening as the horse's canter dropped down to a walk beneath them. She could feel the warm flanks of the horse swaying slowly beneath them, like the tides of a river. "You are safe with me, I promise you, Sarah."

"Safe from being killed, you mean," she muttered out loud before she could stop herself. 

"Oh, but of course…" His breath warmed her ear as he murmured to her. "I assure you might suspect yourself to be in a great _deal_ of danger from me…but not your life, love…"

She shivered involuntarily as his lips brushed right beneath her earlobe; beneath her thick gloves, her palms were sweating wildly. "Jareth, quit it…"

"Quit wiggling," he muttered into her neck. "You're upsetting Palomides."

_And other people_, she thought; his body was pressing a little too tightly next to hers. Palomides' ears were flicked back, she noticed, and he danced sideways a few steps as if to warn her any shrieking or slapping would only cause an equine panic. She would've suspected the horse of cooperating with Jareth's unceasing attempts to seduce her if she could believe the horse would accept her around a minute more than his master demanded. From the way the horse had been running around so far, it'd be more likely he'd dump her right off, though, than deliberately force her to endure the hellish temptation of Jareth's caresses.

She smacked the hand on her stomach lightly. "Stop it and tell me where the hell you've taken me now." 

He groaned and glanced around. "We're in the back courtyard." This meant nothing to Sarah; she suspected the castle beyond the Goblin City had sixty fronts and sixty rear facades, given that every time she walked outside, she saw a new landscape and new horizon. She swept her eyes across the curving wall of the castle and saw the giant balcony above. There was a figure of a young woman up there, watching the activity beneath. 

"Who's that?" 

Jareth's head tilted to the castle, and suddenly Palomides was turning away from the castle yards, cantering lightly away from the structure. Above the drumbeats of the horse's hooves, she heard his voice, short and tight. "Elana. My father's mistress." 

Sarah tried to peer over Jareth's shoulder but they were already too far away for her to tell anything about the girl. "But she's so _young!_" 

"And you are ancient, I presume?" 

She swatted his knee at his dry tone. She bit her lip briefly as her hand reluctantly drew back from the firm muscle there. _Damn it, that was a stupid idea. Touching him is like sending an alcoholic into a liquor shop. _"What is it with you people? First, you put the moves on me when I was _fifteen_---"

"I hardly put anything on you, dear lady," he answered coolly. She glanced back over her shoulder at him, worried. _Well, why should I be worried? He shouldn't get offended by the truth! He _did _flirt like nobody's business with me then_, _even though he obviously saved the bigger weapons for now that I'm older_. _Or maybe_, she thought, her eyes dropping to her leg, and his leg beyond, _I just wasn't aware of those weapons yet_.

She jumped when she heard him speak again. "I won't deny, of course, that you provided a great deal of _amusement_ as a child…Not just your little tempers and egotism—"—he smirked down at her as she gasped in outrage—"—but little things, yes…I recall," he said, and paused thoughtfully before continuing, "I so enjoyed that little training top you had…" To her horror, he transferred the reigns to the hand about her waist and lifted his free hand to trace where her bra strap might be beneath her shirt. Very graphic imagery of her first Hello Kitty lingerie passed through her mind's eye, to her nausea.

She flinched back, as much as one can when smushed before a rider on horseback, and screeched in unmitigated horror, "_Jareth!"_

He laughed again and drew back lightly on the reins as Palomides, annoyed, sped up. They were finally trotting up to the stables, she noted distractedly. "Oh, love, of course I wasn't looking in on you in your dishabille." They entered the covered center of the stables, a huge structure, something of a castle for horses, she gathered. While she glanced around, her body was startled by a sudden coolness as he slid off, his hands drawing her down before she could react to her precarious position. He kept his hands on her hips as he leaned forward, finishing in a smoky whisper, "That would be like peeking at a present before Christmas, would it not?"

Various urges warred within her at his murmured tones. She wanted to slap him, scream at him, throw him down in the hay and roll with him, in short, everything his wicked self wanted to call out in her. She bit her lip instead of cursing him—_why give him the satisfaction?_—and instead snatched her skirts in her hand and plowed past him on the hay-strewn stable floor. Palomides flicked a ear at her and she resisted the desire to glare back at him; only Jareth's presence, she suspected, restrained the horse from taking a bite of Williams for his dinner. _Just like his owner, but for different reasons, _the naughty part of her mind, which always went into overdrive when Jareth was around, unhelpfully supplied.

She was distracted; she was also uncomfortable, a city girl with little experience around a horse now in what was surely some horse's idea of equine paradise, and worst of all, she, a blue-jeans baby, was running around in a lady's riding outfit that was one step short of Disney heroine grandeur. Later, when she would allow herself to think back on that particular moment of time (without wincing or calling for a drink first), she wasn't sure which reason caused what happened next. Her boot hooked part of her skirt, drooping in her careless hands; she stepped forward heavily, dropping her skirts and windmilling her arms as she looked down at an approaching bed of hay floor. Instinct caused her to lunge forward to steady herself, and just as she was doing that, Jareth was moving forward to catch her. Unfortunately for him, just as he was bracing to catch her, his lower body was unfortunately positioned—so that just as she frantically jerked her knee upwards from the pool of skirts and hay, in an effort to find secure footing again, her knee came smashing upwards in brutal contact with the most prized jewels in the Goblin Kingdom. 

* * *

Time stretched out like taffy. With a grunt and a gasp, he went down simply on his knee. He was bent over a bit, bracing his palms on his thighs as his eyes shut and his mouth became nothing but a slit. She came down roughly on her own knees next to him, his hands on her elbows still bracing her fall. Sarah brought her hands to her mouth in sickened disbelief. Words came tumbling out of her mouth in a meaningless flood: "Oh, God, oh, God, oh, Jesus, oh, Jareth, oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean—oh, God, are you okay?" In her mind, just one word summed up her spoken thoughts: _Shit_. Of course he wasn't okay. _Dumbass me! Oh, that's the way to make nice with him—knee His Majesty in "the throne room," of all places! _Her knee still burned with the memory of—well, touching _there, _The Area unmentionable and ever-present when her thoughts turned to Jareth—and her brain wanted time to go over the moment and distill every detail, but she was too mortified to do much more than swear, hover uselessly, and thrust out her hands at Jareth's midsection in unthinking panic. 

He twisted his legs into an Indian-position squat and threw his hands back to the sides, breathing deeply and looking upward beneath closed lids. One hand shot forward to imprison her hand as she unthinkingly patted his inner thigh—"Unless you area intending one of your mortal 'kiss and make it better' healing methods, I recommend avoiding that area." 

"Oh!" _Damn, brilliant, Sarah_. She rubbed her cheek—God, she was so red with mortification that she was actually sweating. "I—I—wasn't thinking, I'm sorry, I only meant…"

"I know." He opened his eyes and turned to look at her. A corner of his mouth twitched upward. "You seem to have a habit of making me glad for my superior recovery abilities, Sarah."

She rolled her eyes and glared. "It was an _accident_, it's not like I parade around in fifty pounds of skirts every day—"

His finger was suddenly against her lips. "Shhhh, stop apologizing. I know. And I'm fine now." His finger slid from her lips to trace the curve of her cheek, which was still a blazing scarlet, she just knew it. She looked down, away from the thoughtful glint in his eyes, until his voice called her back to him. "You look quite adorable covered in hay, you know," he murmured softly as she felt his fingers sliding straw from her undone hair. 

"You always say things like that," she muttered without thinking, her hands fisting defensively.

"Maybe it's because I always think it," he said quietly, so quietly she almost didn't hear him.

She glanced upwards, intending to tell him to remove his goblin-gloved hands before he lost them, but the words fell from her lips. He was just laying there, propped up on one hand to his side, managing to look completely relaxed and at home on a hay-packed barn floor, like some kind of overgrown stable boy, blond hair falling a bit into his eyes and just begging to be brushed back by a feminine hand. The dim lighting from the half-shut barn doors left him partly in shadow, but did not hide from her the slight but genuinely fond smile on his face as he drew hay from her hair. There was nothing deliberately seductive in either his pose, his expression, or his touch, but when their gazes finally caught, something twisted painfully in her chest—as if Fate herself had taken a hold of Sarah by within and pulled her forward, leaning into his hand as he turned her chin to face him, as his eyes turned predatory, as his hands fanned out to catch each of her trembling palms, as his lips slid tenderly over hers, and as she felt her body lowering into the hay beneath them.

* * *

It was a horseshoe in the hay that saved her, and nothing else. Hay and a hard stone floor wouldn't normally be the most luxurious bedding one might imagine, but the combination of sun-warmed hay and a hard-breathing Goblin King brushing his lips over her face as if she would dissolve beneath rougher handling were enough to make Sarah happily ignore the setting's discomfort. Not even the heights of passion, however, were immune to a slightly twisted horseshoe that shifted in the straw as she wriggled slightly; it managed to stab her in her lower back, causing her to gasp. 

"Shhh, love, don't fear me," she heard a burning mouth whisper into her ear. "You know I would give any—"

"I have to get up," she blurted out, shoving upwards in pain and panic both. For the first time she could recall, he rolled off without protest, watching her as she turned, her hands digging in the straw to retrieve the shoe behind her. _Oh, God, I don't want to look at him right now…What now? _It was one thing to succumb to a little make-out when the moment demanded it; another thing to consciously okay that sort of behavior. Or misbehavior. Or whatever the hell insanity it was that he regularly inspired her. _This has to stop, Williams! Do you want to stay here forever? Are you asking to be kept his prisoner just so he can hop in the sack with you and then throw you to the side? _

He took the shoe from her, a frown replacing the puzzled expression on his face. "Remind me to dismiss the blacksmith."

"For losing a shoe?" she asked breathlessly, scrambling to her feet to avoid the possibility of an encore performance.

He arched his eyebrow and rose gracefully. A little smile played on the corners of his lips. "For distracting from my guest's pleasure." 

"Oh, you—"

He caught her hand as she swatted his forearm irritably. "—and my own." His shark-like smile appeared and she was acutely aware suddenly that she'd been tricked into surrendering her hand into his. His voice dropped intimately. "Sarah."

She braced her arms and resisted his advance. "Jareth, I can't do this right now."

He smiled darkly. "I'm more than willing to do all the work."

"No!" She tugged nervously at the hands holding her. "You don't understand—Jareth--I—I--I've got to go home _now._"

The smile faded, icebergs for eyes watching her. "You wish to argue again. This is tiresome, Sarah."

He intimidated her but she'd be damned if he would ever, ever see her back down to his little tricks to inspire fear. She snatched her arms away and glared back. "What's tiresome is that you keep trying to seduce me when _I want to go home_. I've told you that over and over again! I can't sit here and—and—I'm not some damn _toy_, Jareth. You seem to think that you can play with me whenever you want and that's all fine, that I'll be happy you're putting the moves on me, as if the fact I'm here not by choice and I _don't_ want to be here doesn't matter. I can't forget my life just because it's convenient for you, Jareth, just because it's a convenient vacation for you."

"As my mouth was a convenient vacation spot for your—" he snapped, before snatching her palm in mid-air, en route to his face. His eyebrows slid down and he hissed, "I warned you about that, Sarah." His gloved hand wrapped tightly around her other arm and both jerked her forward, her chest colliding violently with his. "When will you stop this charade, Sarah? When will you admit what you want, what we both want?"

She froze against him in the semi-dark; where they were standing, she could not see his face, only the glittering of his eyes in the dark as they looked down at her. _Damn it, why do I let him scare me? And why the hell does he make me want to cry? _

He closed his eyes, his hands opening slowly as he let out a long exhale in the silent barn. She stayed as if made a statue by his magic, fearful of alerting his attention and rage. "I told you that you need not fear me, Sarah," she heard him say quietly at long last, his words whispering past her cheek like his caress, but much less warm. "I do not lie. Go now. I will speak with you later."

Idiotically, for a long moment, her fool body refused to move; her hands hesitated over his chest, half inclined to press downward and clutch his shirt reassuringly—to reassure him of what, she did not know. _But I'm not Sensible Sarah for nothing_, she thought bitterly to herself, backing up slowly and wheeling to the door, glancing back to see him, standing in shadows in the middle of the barn, as she fled into the sunlight of the yard.

* * *


	16. All in the Family

  
  
There are forces in the universe of great power.  
Hurricanes.  
Tornados.  
Earthquakes.  
A single female breast, ridiculously overexposed to distract from a dull and dated halftime show.  
  
None of these compare with the overpowering eagerness that is a mother who sees herself on the brink of grandchildren.   
The Queen had emitted a shriek previously known only to the canine realm when Hoggle ducked into a coat closet to give her the news. Now, finally capable of words, she left off her joyous dance of victory and resumed her seat. Say it again! I must hear it, so I won't believe I am dreaming! Oh, I have so longed for this day!  
Her bubbling enthusiasm caused the dwarf to frown--he never could go as far as she could, in her leaps of optimism--but he nodded nonetheless. After all, it sure did look like things were on the right path for once. What else could one think? He'd watched them play on the horse, but Elana kept trying to talk to him, so the only thing he could do was get away. He ended up down in the stable, meaning to get an eyeful there--and did he ever get an eyeful. There was the King himself, sprawled out on the straw without a mind to his fancy clothes, grinning as if he'd just had three pints of ale. And there was Sarah, the blush on her cheeks the pretty pink of the Queen's favorite rose, biting her lip shyly but allowing the King's fingers to coax her to face him. And then, in a moment that had stunned Hoggle to his core, suddenly there they both were, smooching and snuggling like the milkmaid and thegoat-herder were wont to do in the valley fields while the herd grazed insensibly about them. But Hoggle was not about to risk an assumption that the Goblin King and the girl were as blind to the world about them as the maid and the herder usually were. A sensitivity one would not have expected in the gruff old dwarf caused him to flee as, still kissing, the lord of the Labyrinth and his defeater eased back into the straw--or perhaps, he'd admit, Hoggle just did not want to see that rat Jareth in a mushy moment; it did make his stomach kick in protest, to think about it overmuch--but either way, he'dsnuck out of the stable as hastily and as quietly as he could. Not that it made much difference to the King and the girl, though--Hoggle had tripped over a rake by the doorway and caused it to flip loudly over on the cement, but neither of the sweethearts paused for a second to spy the small figure stealing away.   
He hadn't stopped running till he made it into the castle, and into this closet, the first safe place he could find for a private chat with the globe he had been carrying with him. The crystal glowed softly, lighting the closet a bit, but the dwarf admitted to himself he felt more reassured by the palpable sense of relief in the Queen's overjoyed sigh. Tell me, do tell me again, Hoggle dear.  
He coughed roughly and shifted his body uncomfortably against the robes around him. Now he was glad of the semi-lit state of the closet, so the Queen couldn't see his blush. Nothing more to say, Yer Majesty. I ran away when they were--ya know, he muttered, unable to supply the appropriate verb.  
Embarrassment did not come to the Queen with half the intensity it came to Hoggle. In a moment of bliss, she supplied, exhaling rapturously and pressing her palms together over her heart. Oh, this has all been worth it, my dear friend. You will at long last have a lovely Queen to serve the Goblin Kingdom, my son shall be delirious with happiness, and I, she sniffled delicately into her lace handkerchief, shall have to take up knitting blankets and booties shortly. Oh, it is too delightful for words.   
Hoggle grunted, the limits of his ability to show his sympathy. She already knew he supported her plan; she didn't need him fussing over those darned woman-tears of hers. So what do we next?  
She spoke between small happy gulps of air, still daintily drying her cheeks and eyes. I must have word with my estate steward to let him know I will be leaving my cottage here--I will have to come to the Goblin Castle at once--goodness, I hope he hasn't proposed yet! I want to be there to help with the planning for the engagement as well as the wedding, of course! She laughed and beamed at the dwarf, rubbing her gloved fists together, the kerchief pressed between. Oh, Hoggle, I can't tell you how much it means to me that he has his dreams at last!  
The dwarf coughed and rubbed his eye. Damn allergies--rotten bad this time of year, always, he thought, and evaded the Queen's glowing, knowing gaze. He had an instinctive sense to object, to suggest she slow down a bit, to express some doubts that Jareth had not only expressed his suit to Sarah, but that she had accepted--but looking at the Queen, he just couldn't do it. I guesses so, he muttered, looking down. He'd be pretty da--er, I'd figure he'd be pretty darned happy if she said she was sweet on him, too.  
The Queen's beatific smile reminded him of that crazy fox knight's belief in gallant knights and damsels in need of rescue--blind, innocent, and frightening all the same for its intensity. There was a time when he'd gladly have died to hear those words, my dear friend, I do assure you. Oh, how I love a love story! She sat back, her smile melting back into Jareth's smirk of triumph. I wonder if they are even out of the stable yet? Perhaps he's taken her to the gardens for a lovely walk...or the turrets, they do make such a nice place for a moment of affection...perhaps even the lake; it is quiet lovely, even with the ice, and I'm sure the mermaids would be glad to provide some music for them--where could my son and his lovely bride be?  
  
* * *   
  
The lovely bride was at that precise moment dashing down a castle hallway, bent alternately on seeking out the lord of the castle and hiding from the same.   
It was as if that infamous duo of the cartoon angel and devil sat on her shoulders, quarreling away.   
_Maybe you didn't want to be here, but he still protected your ass from whatever got you here, he's been a lot better host than you would have been in his shoes, and if you kept your tongue in your own mouth for once, he might not be trying to get you both all hot and bothered. It's your own fault, Williams. Be a grown-up and apologize, for pete's sake. Remember, he didn't kill you for kneeing him, for heaven's sake._  
She sighed in memory, thanking God silently for the very obvious evidence that Jareth was unharmed by her errant limb during their encounter on the stable floor.  
Sensibility jerked her back to face reality. _Enough of this, Williams! Why are you going looking for him? If you get one step near him, let's face it, you might as well spare him the effort and rip off your clothes yourself--though God knows why he wants to see _that_ when there are all these Charlize Theron types running around--if the novelty of laying a flabby mortal has blinded him so far to the obvious physical differences between yourself and the anorexic Fae sluts shoving their boobs at him, it'll wear off for sure then--and then, what? What is Wham, bam, thank you, ma'am in Fae, I wonder?_  
_ Jesus! Why am I such a neurotic freak? Maybe I should just do it, just accept it's a screw for him and nothing else and do it. At least that way I'll get this out of my system and I'll have climbed the Mt. Everest of sexual fantasies. And if I'm lucky, he'll be so disappointed he'll send me home before it's time to snuggle..._  
She blinked back something hot and wet in her eyes--_damn allergies_--and punched open the nearest door. _Shit, his library. _She stepped back against the library door, which had slid silently closed behind her, and stared in a mixture of remembered lust and fear at the table where---well, where she'd almost made good on all those elementary school films that promised the educational value of going to the library...  
She glanced around silently, trying to ease her quick breathing and get her bearings before stealing off again. She had the sense of a park cleaner falling into a darkened zoo lion's den, not sure if the beast was present or not, awake or not, in short, if the danger in the room was a memory or a warning of impending death.   
_No petite mort today, thanks_, her mind commented sarcastically as she swept her gaze around the aisles. No sign of Jareth. He was still and silent as the Reaper normally, surprise his forte, but nonetheless, you could _sense_ his presence if you paid attention not to reason, but to your body; if you--well, maybe not _listened_, but if you let your body be the judge. There was something cool and sparkling in the air when he was around, like the way naked skin shivered in anticipation as you disrobed before the shower.  
And there was none of that now. But there was something else, some other live presence there. Sarah's hand caught at the library door's handle. _I've seen enough damn horror movies to know if there's someone around you don't see, you don't want to see him. _But the library handle stuck, and her throat went dry, visions of Mike Meyers dancing in her head.  
A distant, velvety chuckle drifted to her ear. Oh, my dear, don't injure yourself now. The door shall open in a moment, I promise you. I only wanted a word before you left.  
She flipped around, flattening her back against the door.   
It was the father. Of course. She bit her lip nervously, random thoughts banging into each other in her skull. _Darth Vader himself_. _Or is he more the Evil Emperor? Whatever_. The High King walked, amused, into silhouette before the windows opposite her; the whiteness of the sunlight around him hid the sharpness of his features, but she knew enough to see the smug mouth turn into a grin, the arrogant tilt of the chin, the insolent set of the shoulder. How amusing that we should chance upon one another here, don't you think? This is, after all, where we first set eyes on each other...Although my son's eyes were more taken with you, I think, and he chuckled fondly.   
She swallowed. _Okay, he's Jareth's dad, how do I handle him? I can't exactly tell him where to step off. But he's obviously taken lessons from Get Laid University, Dean Goblin King presiding. Or maybe,_ she thought, a horrible idea coming upon her, _Jareth has just learned a few tips from _him_ and he's the master of the score. Oh, God. _She shook her head to herself. _No, there's no way there's anybody better than _him.  
Yes, my dear? The High King tilted his head and took a slow, mocking step forward.  
Bullying parental figures, as the King's son had once learned, never went over well with Sarah. She slouched against the door in an image of youthful defiance, folding her arms, yawning in a bored fashion, and giving all the signs of being on the verge of a dismissive Not to be rude or anything, but I don't know what you want. You're a stranger to me. _And to Jareth, _she wanted, for some bizarre reason, to spit spitefully at the man, but she bit the urge down. _Where the hell did that come from? _  
I want to have a little word with you, nothing more, he responded, easing his body down on the edge of the table, that little smile never wavering, while the eyes above it were searching. You are, after all, my son's inamorata, if the gossips are to be believed.  
She had no clue what that word meant, although it sounded vaguely immoral. She wondered if she should be offended, but with an internal sigh, thought that if the likes of Magda and Lippie imagined her to be up to no good with Jareth, they'd consider it a point of compliment, not insult. We are...friends, she fumbled slightly_, _as he laughed outright at her awkward word choice. Her cheeks burned at the doubting arch of his eyebrow. _Yeah, friends who paw at one another's clothing and wind up on library tables in compromising positions_. Embarrassed, irritated, she snapped, But I'm hardly going into details with you, sir.  
He held up a conciliatory hand, shaking his head gently. Ahh, don't fly into a rage, my dear. I don't mean to cause you any shame, I assure you. In our world, the pursuit of pleasure is quite valued. His teeth gleamed whitely as he smiled. And a woman of your beauty would be the object of all pursuit, were she not already marked by the King. His hand tipped to the side slightly, still grinning; he looked a bit like some bizarre Mr. Rogers impersonator, explaining the ways of the world to a child. She half-expected him to pat her on the head and indeed, the effect of his patronizing speech was about the same.  
She rolled her eyes outright. You couldn't say to a king, but she knew it when she smelled it, all right. _Sure is getting deep in here_. Um, thanks. But anyway--you wanted something...? His annoyingly slow way of getting to the point, so like his damnable son's, was a bit scary, actually--she kept remembering Jareth's caution to stay away from his father and call for him should the King appear. She wondered if she should call for Jareth now, but what would that sound like? A random screech of his name? And just how offended would his dad be? Oh, er, excuse me, I have no idea _why_, but you freak me out a bit, and I think I'm just going to call your son, who seems to have some hate issues with you--here's a card of a therapist I saw with Karen, it might work for you too...? And then Jareth's face. Why in the heavens did you call me? To reach a shelf too high for you? I must apologize, love, but it seems my ability to stretch out today has been compromised--some unappreciative child attempted to murder my heirs before I had the pleasure of making them...  
The King rose suddenly and she jumped a little. He did not react, instead stalking up and down before her, eyes slitted. His mouth was still curved in a charming grin, but his pace had the tension of an assassin about to spring. I want to know what you seek in my son, child.  
She almost laughed into the doorjamb with relief. _Oh, er, a ticket home? _She even considered asking him to send her home, right now, but something held her back, something that told her as badly as Jareth would take it if she left now, he'd be triply ticked off it if were his dad who sent her packing. Um, excuse me? I have no idea what you mean--?  
He spun on his heel abruptly to face her; he had Jareth's shark grin, but she could almost see the blood on these pointed teeth. A crown, is that it? Do you mean to be queen, my dear?  
Well, that one required no thought to answer. she sputtered in genuine shock.  
He was not put off, regarding her icily. I've seen the dance you put him through, my dear. You are not the only one adept in the games of...amour, shall we say. Fanged teeth flashed. And I know in your realm, mortals have tried this before...The innocent maid protests too much--oh, no, she dare not, she is virtuous!--until and unless the crown sits on her brow. He jerked his chin sharply. I grant you, it is but a variation of a centuries old trade, the body for the power, but my darling, such games do not sit well here. My son is wiser than you think. She gaped at him. Oh, yes, you think him a fool for you, as does the majority of the court, I am sure. I myself have seen him and I admit, my son no doubt does esteem you far more than any he's had before. But child, and his eyes slitted, do not mistake what you are. You offer nothing to him he's not had before. He motioned sharply to the side and a book appeared before her, a drawing book of blurred, half-completed sketches of the passion of a man and woman...a man and women, she saw, her stomach turning...and there was no mistaking the bliss on the final woman's face, nor the familiar wildness of blond hair resting against her lower abdomen--and Sarah turned away, crying out, dryheaving behind hands pressed involuntarily over her mouth.   
Yes, child, the hellish voice went on. He is my son, after all. He is no stranger to a woman's bed or body. You would give him nothing new, after all, nothing to hold him after this little glamour of his passes. She opened her eyes to ask him to shut up, stop, go away, but the book at least was gone and the King's face was gentler now. He may be, after all, a romantic like his mother, but I am not, my dear. I know the ways of men and women. And that is why I am here.  
He towered over her suddenly, looking into her streaming eyes thoughtfully. Perhaps you are but an innocent, my dear, and perhaps you've nothing to do with his bewitchment for you...perhaps. But I will not have some chit thinking she can harness my son by his manhood and control his kingdom thusly. My son is not of that ilk. He grinned. He is of mine, and we are not controlled by the boudoir, my darling girl. He took her hand gently and pressed his lips to the knuckles in a gentlemanly caress. Though of course we do _most_ appreciate it, I assure you. Again the flashing smile, the taunting glint in the eye. Do you understand, my dear?  
She shook her head mutely, too horrified still to speak as her hand fell limply from his. The unnatural friendliness and charm fled his features, leaving them cuttingly sharp and cold. Do not play games with my son or with me, my dear. You will lose, and lose most painfully, I promise you. I will not have him played for a fool, my dear. If you keep him from your bed to make him so desperate for you that he would offer you the crown in exchange for a wedding night, my dear, you presume, and presume most unwisely. Better than you have tried and failed. And worse than all will you be when I have done with you. My son and my throne will fall to no pitiful plotter. He stepped back, bowing slightly, a little grin on his lips. Call it a father's instinct, if you will...Let it be just this: I will see through any falsehood on your part...I will be watching...  
She nodded, because it seemed the thing to do, her lips parted to get some air into her frozen system. He laughed boldly, not the menacing chuckle of before, but a full-bodied laugh that rang through the air. Oh, child, you look as if you've seen a ghost! he said in a voice that would be malicious, but for the hostile speech before--in comparison, this seemed just a joke. Fear not, for after all, if you mean him no harm, the king's shoulder's shrugged, nor will I mean you harm. He grinned, settling back on the edge of the table. Though I would mean a lovely sort such as yourself otherwise...  
Even with an echo of Jareth's sex appeal, this man's teasing offer repulsed her completely. No, _thank you_, she snarled instantly, before remembering to add a _Get the hell away from me,_ she wanted to add, but instead her hand clawed at the door. Still locked, and the King's eyes danced in amusement. Furious, she turned back to him. Will you unlock it or do I need to call your son to do it for me?   
His eyes narrowed slightly, appreciating the unspoken threat. Of course I shall fix the door problem for you. It does seem to stick on occasion, I have heard. His fingers flipped casually on his lap.  
She jerked the door open with such force she nearly toppled herself over in her effort. Goodbye, then, she muttered, dashing through the doorway. His voice drifted after her, taunting.  
I so look forward to speaking with you again.  
  
* * *  
Damn it!  
She nearly trampled Hoggle as she sprinted around the corner en route to her room. Instead, Sarah collided with the dwarf and went sprawling on the marble floor, her fall lightened only by the thick carpeting and the body of the dwarf beneath her.   
_This is so not my day. Or maybe, not the day of any male around me, _she thought and grunted, shifting hastily to the side. God, are you okay?   
Fine as can be with me nose smushed into the floor, the dwarf muttered, shoving himself upright. In a second, he was at her side, rubbing his nose with one hand and offering the other palm quite unselfconsciously--as if he really could haul her to her feet. She took the hand without commentary and got up without pulling on him. Cor, Sarah, are you all right? The king'll have my head if--  
I'm fine, just fine, she interrupted hastily, searching the halls with her eyes.   
No, you ain't, he answered sharply and she returned her vision to him, remembering the tearstains on her face far too late to hide them. What's been making you cry, Sarah?   
She knew better than to deny it or blow it off. _He's just going to throw a scene anyway, and all that will do is get Jareth here in a second. If one of the goblins sees me as a mascara-running mess, you can bet Jareth will be summoned in a heartbeat. _Shhh, come with me! she hissed, grabbing her skirts and dragging Hoggle into her room.  
Although the room was large, they sat, huddled together on the bed, as they used to do in Sarah's parents' home; at Sarah's command, they even whispered to one another. For one thing, she was horribly embarrassed about revealing to Hoggle the extent to which matters had progressed physically with Jareth--she adored the dwarf, but the details of her sex life were not the sort of stuff she wanted to tell an old man, let alone an old dwarf. For another, she was scared to death that any second now, a certain Goblin King would come in and all hell would break loose about the incident in the library.  
Hoggle did, at least, manage to take the story about the stable interlude well. He didn't even seem that surprised and it was on the tip of her tongue to ask him why, but he claimed anybody could see the king meant to kiss her, it was just a matter of time. _To kiss and other things,_ she thought nervously, rubbing her hands into the comforter and remembering the length of his body against hers that morning. She flushed and reminded him that the kiss had been stopped, that she had stayed sane long enough to plead to be sent home again, even if that sanity cost the Goblin King _his_ good mood, and it had all gone to heck between them as a result.   
_What? _What have you done, Sarah? gasped the little dwarf, and Sarah's head whipped to him in true bewilderment. _You'd think I'd broken off an engagement at the altar, with that sort of reaction_.  
I just stuck to my guns, that's all! Look, I've told everyone umpteen times, I need to go _home_. I want to go_ home_. I'm not getting involved with anyone here just because I'm pretty much forbidden to leave and go elsewhere. I'm not that bored. She almost laughed at herself. Jareth was hardly, in a thousand years, a fallback, a weakness of boredom.   
Hoggle apparently thought she sounded ridiculous, too, because he snorted loudly. And there's that say girls ain't fickle.   
She bristled. Fickle? Excuse me! To be fickle you have to choose someone or something in the first place, before you can reject them!  
The dwarf shot her a look. Sure seems like you had, from the sounds o' it...  
She blushed to the roots of her hair. In her retelling of the incident, the heavy-panting session in the straw had become a chaste tap on the lips, but apparently, Hoggle had seen right through her self-censorship. His tone made his meaning horribly apparent, and she had to burn with shame, because he was right. She _was_ human, she _was_ straight, and every bone in her body went wild with thoroughly animal impulses when the temptation of Jareth was around her. So she was culpable, to an extent, but it wasn't her own will.   
God! How did this happen! I didn't choose this! And I don't even have time for a boyfriend! she cried out, throwing the pillow in front of her face and flopping backward on the mattress.  
Hoggle was, as always, the comforting type. Seems you gots one, all the same.  
She tossed the pillow to the side and glared at him. Hoggle, if you mean a guy who's been with more women than there are goblins in this castle, who wants nothing but--but--but another notch on his bedpost, maybe that's true, but don't you think it'd be better for me _not_ to invite a disaster like that into my life? She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood as she remembered those drawings, the black and white lines flickering in her imagination like animation cells, the golden head descending upon the nude woman's lower torso..._What do I have that they don't, to keep him...Shut the hell up, Williams! He's not worth it! _She rubbed her eyes angrily.  
He scratched his nose quizzically. What's this about, Sarah? What'd he say that's got you crying?  
She stared at the ceiling dismally. Hell, she might as well tell Hoggle. Well, as much as she could without traumatizing the dwarf as badly as she herself had been. I saw Jareth's father.  
Yep, and?  
No, I talked to him, she said miserably, rolling over to face Hoggle. He looked openly alarmed.  
You know the king don't want you near him! We's supposed to keep you away from him!  
Yeah, but it wasn't anybody's fault, it was by chance--I think. Did he pursue her to that room, lead her there, or was it really all an accident? She shuddered and made herself go back to her explanation. I was going to see Jareth in his library, and I ran into his father instead. He locked the door, so I couldn't escape, and said the most horrible things to me.   
She twisted her hand in the comforter unhappily as Hoggle breathed, Sarah, there'll be hell to pay, that's for sure. What'd the big rat do? Maybe I should goes to get Jareth now for ya? He's a rat but he won't let his dad do anything that'll make you cry, that's for sure.   
She sat upright, drawing her knees to her chest. Oh, God, Hoggle, I don't know. He didn't say anything but the truth, I guess. He was worried, I think, that I was, um, manipulating Jareth. How the hell to say the next part? Um, that I wouldn't, um, er, that is, sleep with Jareth so he'd, um, er, be crazy enough to marry me, just for that, she said hastily. _Can my skin get any more red? Thank you so much, lovely Irish ancestors. Why couldn't I have been born with a tan? Or no sense of shame? _  
She hazarded a glance at Hoggle--at least he didn't appear to be in need of psychiatric help yet. He just looked bored. Well, that's nutty, he scoffed, shrugging. No sense be cryin' 'bout that. Old coot was all wrong there, that's all.  
Yeah, but...  
But what, girlie? barked the dwarf. Better tells me if they's more to say, Sarah, or I'll get Jareth here to hear the rest.  
She glared. You wouldn't betray me like that, I know you, Hoggle. He met her gaze, eye to eye, until she sighed and conceded. Fine, this is what happened. He was worried, like I said, and he threatened me if I did mean to, er, play Jareth like that. The dwarf made a noise of outrage. It was--it was kind of frightening, I admit. But that wasn't the worst of it. The King----_breathe, Sarah, just get it out there-- _--well, he said I hadn't anything Jareth hadn't seen or had before, that there was nothing special about me to keep his interest beyond--beyond, well, getting to sleep with me, basically. And then he showed me sketches--I think they were some of Jareth's drawings of his--his-- God damn, she was pitiful; her eyes were spilling over with scorching tears again and her stomach was rolling in protest. She closed her wet eyelids and forced the words out. Sketches of his lovers. And in some, of himself--together, you know. It made me sick, she whispered.   
She had her hands to her face, crying like a stupid baby again, too miserable to be surprised when Hoggle's little arms enclosed her shoulders. Awww, Sarah, don't yous think on it. His damned father ain't got no idea of what it's like to be really sweet on a lady, and so he's no notion of how that Jareth thinks on you. We alls know it, don't you worry.  
But those God-damned drawings...  
She felt Hoggle's little frame shrug. Him's always liked his ladyfriends, you ain't surprised by that, is you? She sighed defeatedly. He just ain't lost ' is 'ead over any of 'em, no matter what sort of stuffs they play. You was always different, Sarah, we alls know that. That's why his mum--  
She looked up curiously as the dwarf's voice cut off. His mother what?   
Hoggle swallowed slowly; for a second, a flash of something like horror was on his face, before he gave her his shy smile again. Why his mom liked you so, that's what. She knows him, she knows every lil' thing 'bout him, Sarah, and she says he never gave no Fae wench no thoughts like he gives you. Just you go ask him, he finished in a sudden surge, as if an idea had just hit him. Asks him if he ever fancied some other lass like you.   
_How the hell do I ask him if he has ever liked somebody better than me when I supposedly don't even like him? We all know what would happen if I did--hello, heartbreak! Hello, depression central! Set aside all the Haagen Daaz in the world for when _that_ dream would fall apart! _She sighed. _I'm too sensible to be hung up him. Okay, yeah, I admit it, I would rather be in a car accident than see those God damned drawings again--but I have to go home! I can't just ask him if he wants to be more than a one-night stand and not expect him to think I want him around for a relationship! Like Jareth could have a normal relationship! He's not exactly boyfriend material!_ _He's not the type to forget your birthday and hog the remote and run off to spend the majority of his free time drinking with overgrown frat boy friends!_  
The old devil on her shoulder resurfaced to whisper, _Maybe not boyfriend material, but he sure is the dream lover type, isn't he? Not exactly what you'd find around the university, that's for sure. And isn't that what you've always wanted, anyway? A guy just like him? _  
I hate myself, she mumbled, pressing her fingers against her closed eyelids.   
A bewildered Hoggle patted her shoulder. You's just confused, that's all, girlie. You's been worrying too much.  
Pot, meet kettle, she grumbled under breath, but didn't explain the slang to the puzzled dwarf. So what do I do?  
You gotta tell him, insisted Hoggle. Tell him it all. Feelin's and stuff, he offered in response to her questioning look.  
_Okay, feelings and stuff, then. _She sighed and stared out at the windows at the blue, blue sky. The trees still had their wintry barrenness but something about the sky's radiance suggested spring would be soon. _Spring, and a young man's heart turns to love_, she thought irritably to herself. _Isn't that how it goes? God, I am a neurotic case._  
She ignored Hoggle's presence briefly and consulted her intuition. Yes, she'd have to confront Jareth. Not to ask him about his intent, no--that'd be _asking_ for some kind of trauma, be it him laughing in her face or slyly suggesting that she _wanted_ him to have intentions, which was absolutely untrue, of course. No, she'd just have to confront him and tell him she was obviously here at a bad time, that, okay, she didn't hate his guts and maybe, maybe, she wouldn't be so freaked out by his attentions if he'd just--well, if he'd just give her distance. As in, Earth-to-Underground sort of distance. She'd even invite the cheating bastard--she was in no mood to ask herself why those words came to mind--on a damned date, if she had to, to get him to take her home. She'd make it clear this time--no pleading, no playing nice--no home, and all he'd get was her bitch side. And if he wanted more of her nice side--or any _other_ side of her, that little devil helpfully supplied--he would take her home. Period. No debate. Simple.  
Piece of cake, she grumbled, shoving off the bed and heading for the door.  
Hoggle hopped off the bed and ran after her. You knows those words always get us in trouble!  
  
* * *  
He ran after her as quickly as his little legs could go, but those mortal girls sure could move fast, Hoggle decided, hustling to keep up. She was probably not even sure where she was going, he thought a tad resentfully--she'd get lost, probably want to sit and cry a bit eventually, and then he'd have to be there, though, so he _had_ to keep scurrying after her, even if it made his ol' ticker beat like one of them goblin bombs.   
But eventually, he saw a stream of light ahead of them, and caught his bearings, though he didn't know if Sarah yet had hers. They were just steps from the Great Hall--and his large ears could make out the distant drift of the Goblin King's voice, rather irritably giving a command to one of his creatures.   
Sarah said breathlessly, picking up speed.   
Hoggle redoubled his own pace to match her--he even managed to get a few strides ahead before he slammed to a stop, Sarah sprawling into him again.   
she cried out.   
Sar--oh, no, answered the familiar arch tones of the High Prince; he appeared at the head of a hallway touching the Great Hall right across from theirs, but his head had swiveled away from them sharply, to the center of the room.   
Oh, no, groaned an older male voice; the dark-cloaked figure of the High King flinched visibly in a third hallway.  
Your Ma--oh, goodness! said a high feminine voice; Elana stumbled to a stop at the fourth hallway, looking between the figure in the middle and the High King.   
Hoggle stared at all of them, assembled at the entry to the hallways like spokes around a wheel--and the hub was her, the older woman beaming with joy as she threw down her embroidered bags.   
Darling, I'm home!  
Hoggle found his own tongue at last, though he didn't think of what he said and he doubted anybody even heard what he said.   
Hell's bells, we're in for it now.  
  
* * *  
  



	17. Family Portraits

_Author's Note: I normally dislike ANs (I admit, I rarely read them!), but I thought I should offer an apology for the very long time it took to update this; personal matters took me a bit off-track. I am working on Ch. 18 and I hope to resume my former speedy update schedule in the very near future. _

Nature loves opposites. The black of night gives way to the brilliant light of morning; summer's heat cools to winter ice; the darkly evil Jerri will be forever in love/hate with the cowboy hero, Colby. 

That it is how it happens with what we hear, too. Silence tends to invite sound--the bigger, the better. In this particular example (the science laboratory of relationships that was the Goblin Castle then), the Great Hall went from stunned silence to an eruption of sound in a matter of seconds. All around Sarah, exclamations volleyed and slammed across the fluttering flags and shields that decorated the hall: 

"Jareth, darling! I'm so happy for you!" 

"Happy for me? I beg your pardon?" 

"Yer Majesty! Lemme get ya settled and then see His Majesty!" 

"Hoggle, is that you? Oh, Sarah, my dear girl, I didn't see you there!" 

"Um--" 

"What in the blazes is going on here? What are _you_ doing here? Not enough trouble in your own castle without interfering in my vacation time?" 

"Quite like you to think so, _darling_. How convenient to remember you've a son when you need a getaway for you and your latest bad habit. Don't look so shocked--news does travel, you know. And who is that little girl, pray tell? A daughter you recently discovered?" 

"I am no little girl, my lady." 

"Compared to me, dear creature, you always will be." 

"Mother, if you please--" 

"Madame, is this necessary?" 

"So long as you conduct yourself like this, dearest, it will be." 

"Umm...this is a family talk--I should go..." 

"Now you see what you've done? You're driving Sarah away with your boorish behavior!" 

"Mother, _please_ desist--" 

"Jareth, dear, stay out of this." 

"Normally, I would quite happily, but you see, you're carrying on in the middle of my home--" 

"Ma'am, let's get--there's folks here you don't need to see right now--" 

"My son is quite right; your hysteria is ill-becoming, woman--" 

"_Hysteria? _Did you dare suggest the High Queen of the Underground is hysterical? Oh, I must be imagining things. As I imagined certain things on our wedding night--" 

"I speak for myself, thank you. And I said nothing of hysteria--" 

"Enough, woman! Have I not put up with enough--" 

"Certain things? Did she mean your little--oh, Your Grace!" 

"What the hell--" 

"_Be silent!" _

One last roar punctured the cloud of accusations and enmity in the room. Jareth's crop slapped viciously into the wall of the doorway before he marched towards the center of the hall and the dais there. He snatched up one of his mother's bags and thrust it at a goblin skittering fearfully in his wake; to the room, he offered a face of fury. "I will not endure this under my own roof. You," he said, the crop pointing at Elana, "may retire from the hall. My father will see to you when he will. You will not address my mother, on pain of my _not_ restraining her next time. Understood?" Elana nodded anxiously and scurried away. "You, goblins, come here." A flood of them moved out of the hallway where he had entered. "Take my mother's luggage to her chambers." He turned his head to his head to glare down at Hoggle, who had been fruitlessly tugging at the Queen's skirts, half to restrain her, half to get her attention. Either way, it hadn't worked. "You, Hoggle, shall escort my lady away from this scene and entertain her." His eyes slid to Sarah, dismissing her with a slight, neutral nod. His mouth tightened as he turned to face his father, standing coldly in the doorway. Hoggle tugged on Sarah's hand but she refused to go, waiting to hear what came next. "Father, I must speak to Mother privately now--I take it you have nothing to say to the both of us?" 

"Of course not," the High King responded frostily. "Do repair to your discussion." 

"I will," his son responded curtly, already turning away. "I will see you in the study, Mother." He was evidently as irked with his mother as his father, Sarah observed, for he stalked to another hallway, not the one nearest his mother, and he did not wait for her to catch up with him. _Mr. Passive-Aggressive, eh? _ Sarah mused, staring. His mother shrugged with obvious annoyance and headed off in an opposite direction; the High King, Sarah saw, had already stormed off. The room had been left cold and quiet but for the loud slap of the Goblin King's boots striding across the hall. 

Something clenched inside her, perhaps an instinctive reminder of what she'd come to him for, the means of establishing a peace between them, and thus her release. Unthinking, she jerked her hand from Hoggle's and dashed after the solitary man nearing the darkened exit hall. She grabbed his swinging arm before she could think, before she could register the tension of muscle and nerves beneath her fingers as the royal profile tilted towards her. Before her distressed face, his cool glance at her dissolved into a moment of confusion and questioning. _Say it!_ her heart thundered--somewhere, on a tiny movie projector in her head, she could almost _see_ herself offering a quick, brilliant reason for him to dispatch her from the scene at once. She saw him nodding at once, and then the castle, and the insanity of its occupants, fading away into a land of normality, of bills and Diet Cokes and morning news shows and shivering while you pumped your own gas. But the movie projector in her head, like that in all of our own imaginations, had nothing to do with the reality that came forward from her. Staring up into his white face, the harsh set of the mouth, the tense lines in the forehead, half-hidden under sharp planes of golden bangs--she forgot to plead for her own desires. Something else was more important. 

"Are you okay?" she heard herself whisper to him, and though she hadn't the slightest idea why she was asking, or why she cared, she still understood somehow that the answer was vitally important to her. 

He stared at her for a long moment--_is that shock?--_then glanced away. "I will be," he murmured softly, before barking again. "Hoggle! Take her away now." 

She scowled at Jareth for summoning the dwarf like her jailer--a part of her pleased that he did break into a mocking grin at her sulking face as Hoggle hauled her off--but found she couldn't quite keep up the angry expression when the Goblin King swept her a small bow and stalked off into the darkened hall behind him. 

* * * 

Children, Jareth could easily have told you, are by nature evil. 

Humankind generally suffering from centuries of lecturing on being good, adults have, as a rule, managed to mask the presence of dark forces in their characters. They have distanced themselves from their baser instincts in the same way that the humanity living in polluted cities and industrialized farmlands has separated itself from its contact with the land, and a simpler life. An adult fudges a lie, stammers, blushes tellingly; a child lies with the eyes of an angel, and then makes a run for that cookie before Mom even hears the pitter-patter of deadly quick feet. It is the fool who wishes this world were run by children; the wise man shudders, knowing full well an infant's deviousness could top any politician's. 

Sarah, barely more than a child herself and having lived through Toby's formative years, was more than aware of this. Of course, her initial run-in with Jareth had been triggered by Toby's brattishness...and maybe her victory over Jareth, too, had been the result of her monstrous, childish determination to succeed (as well as a few tantrums, too). But regardless of how childish qualities had served her then, they served her now, too. Because she remembered what she and Toby used to do when they were at their grandmother's. 

Listen through the vents. 

* * * 

_Thank God he's gone_, she thought to herself, slipping outside of the door of her bedroom. Hoggle had gone off, muttering something about needing a drink, so she imagined he wouldn't be back for a while. _Wish he'd bring me a drink_, she snorted to herself, then remembered the hellacious hangover she'd had upon waking up in the Queen's Castle and shrugged off that wish. _Strike that idea, then. Best to just get on with the plan, Williams._

Not that she'd had any brilliant ideas, of course. She was hardly some "Alias"-style Macgiver girl with all the answers. It was really quite mundane. She'd feigned a dainty migraine, lying back on her bed with a hand over her eyes to indicate her helplessness, in the hopes that it would encourage Hoggle to go, and it did. Now, having carefully counted out two minutes since he'd trotted off, she slid down the hallway to the overlook area just past Jareth's bedroom. Just beneath there, if her guess was right, Jareth would meet with his mother. _And she'd better have some damned answers_, a voice in her head muttered as she gritted her teeth. Jareth might not be as royally ticked off at her as earlier, but still, she didn't trust _his_ answers a bit just now. 

_Well, let's be honest--I don't feel like believing anything short of a ticket home_, she thought and shrugged nonetheless. It wasn't her fault the situation made no sense. She just wanted to go home! 

_And make sure he's okay_. "Shut up," she whispered to herself, but naturally, said self had no interest in obeying and behaving in a convenient manner. _Fine_, she scowled. She didn't want to see the Goblin King upset, and from the looks of things, the court was about to get very upsetting for Jareth. She already knew he didn't like his father (for whatever reason, although the fact he had acted like a complete bastard to her did spring to mind), his mother was a pushy sort, obviously they were a high-tempered family, and, well, it just smacked too much of all those old, hideously awkward moments when her mother had found out that her father was dating again. You just knew that some horrible family fireworks would ensue, even if all parties had made it clear the divorce was for the betterment of world peace and the rightness of the universe. Even now, she didn't want to mention Karen, or Toby, to her mother, because she knew she'd be setting up for _something_ to happen. Until the past few years, in fact, she'd wondered if her mother and Karen had any other hobbies in their lives beyond baiting one another. 

Her muscles went to water with relief as she saw a decisively cut vent placed in the floorboards of the overlook area. There was nobody around--and how on earth could she look more idiotic than she already did, anyway?--so she knelt to the ground and made no pretense of not eavesdropping. 

"I have been waiting." The voice was a low, dark, masculine growl, the kind that automatically sent guilty shivers of pleasure up and down Sarah's spine. She smacked herself for her own vulnerability. _Good grief, you think you'd be used to the fact the guy has an 900-number voice by now. Even when he's angry, it's a turn-on. _She bit her lip, glancing about as if she expected someone nearby to be reading her thoughts, before admitting it to herself. _Heck, the anger might even be more of a turn-on. _

_ "_I believe those were my words after forty-eight hours of labor with you, my darling boy." _Well, no doubt about who that is..._

_ "_I'm in no mood for games, Mother. Where, precisely, have you been, and what brings you here now?" 

"Oh, here and there, naturally. Did you miss me? Have lovely news for me, perhaps?" 

"Mother," he growled again, causing goosebumps to rise happily on Sarah's skin. _Damn him for having that voice_. "I have had an unpleasant afternoon and I would rather not share the unpleasantness by dropping you or Father into the Bog. Now, would you kindly explain your arrival?" 

The Queen's sigh was loud and impatient. "Oh, for heaven's sake. I am trying in earnest, my son, to give you an opportunity to _tell me something_," she finished with heavy emphasis. 

A long silence followed--so long that Sarah actually wondered if they had left the room before Jareth's voice was heard again. "Fine, I yield. What in the gods' names are you on about?" 

"Sarah...?" 

"Sarah--ahh. Sarah." He paused sharply before resuming in a more measured voice: "Mother, I have already told you I will not discuss my personal affairs with you." 

"And I never said I would stop asking, my dear. Besides, I think you would need to tell me if you were engaged, no?" 

A floor away from the conversation, Sarah gaped and exclaimed in shock before she could stop herself. "What the hell--" She froze but it was rapidly apparent her commentary had gone unnoticed. 

Below her, Jareth, apparently, was of a sympathetic turn of mind. "_Engaged?"_

_ "_You were seen--" The Queen's voice broke off suddenly and Sarah frowned suspiciously at the floorboards. Anybody in Jareth's gene pool getting an opportunity to connive was a bad, bad event, her gut told her. The Queen finally cleared her throat, her voice ringing confidently through the floorboards. "Darling, let us say this--it's apparent the affair is going quite well, and I had hoped you would have successfully resolved your....prior issues...with her." 

"Let us say not," he snapped. "She wishes to leave. She has made it very clear to me." 

"You know she is only deceiving herself!" the Queen exclaimed and Sarah raised a dubious eyebrow. _Thanks, Mommy Dearest. How the hell does she know me so well, when we've talked for all of a few minutes total? _"Be patient, my son--" 

"When have I not been patient?" he snarled back, and perhaps Sarah would have been thinking back to her reaction to his earlier growl, but the phrasing was just too damnably similar to his spiel about generosity before she left the Labyrinth the first time. She'd nearly laughed in his face then and she couldn't help but break out a defiant smirk now. For a smart man, he was the one quite able to deceive himself. 

_Oops, missing some of it,_ she thought, hearing louder voices below. She lowered her ear to the floor again, closing her eyes to concentrate on the quickly snapped statements flying through the air. 

"Too patient, I should say! Too patient, in that you wait for her to discover--" 

_Discover what? _Her abdominal muscles clenched as she held her breath, straining to hear. 

"Mother--" 

"--discover what you feel--" 

Not good, not good at all...She bit her lip and tasted blood, remembering how he'd looked, smiling at her in the straw. Before she nearly went for a roll in the hay with him, of course. Feelings were damned dangerous things. 

He apparently agreed; he was spitting like a cat in the room below her: 

"Mother, I warn you--" 

The Queen's voice railed on regardless. "--to realize you love her, without requiring you to say the words yourself. Cease with that expression, Jareth. Yes, the words need courage, but isn't she worth a bit of effort now?" 

Something slammed--a hand on wood? "Oh, for the sake of the gods, Mother! This is intolerable," he hissed and Sarah shivered instinctively. That tone never boded well. "This subject is _dropped._" 

The female voice that responded was unafraid. "You will _not_ speak to me in such tones again, my son. I will remind you that I am your mother and I did not carry you nine months to be treated insufferably by you now. Who bore you? Who fed you? Who changed your little clothes and bathed your little--" 

There came a tired growl. "_Enough_. I am a grown man, Mother--" 

"Not that you act like one," the Queen retorted. 

"I will handle my own affairs, and that's the end of this." 

Instead of a frightened silence, she heard a decidedly disrespectful snort in the room below. "Naturally. And meanwhile, you will mope around and try to deny--" Jareth seemed to hiss something again, but this time indecipherable. She pressed her ear harder to the floor--absently, she wondered about how the hell she'd explain the splinters in her ear afterwards--and willed all of her cells to give her some sort of creepy, freaky, but quite handy Legolas-range hearing. 

In a split second, she'd find out that wish didn't come true. Rather than a graceful creature of silence and stealth, she demonstrated, for the umpteenth time in her life, that she was a clumsy, awkward, and in general rather normal sort of human being. Because that was when the bellow at her ear slammed into her head like a fist, when she jumped off the ground with a caterwauling screech of fright, and ended up flopping back on her rear like a drunken fool, staring up into Hoggle's outraged face. 

"SARAH!" 

* * * 

_God damn it! _She wanted to bite his head off, but unfortunately, having just been a.) caught snooping and b.) let off a scream that probably had attracted the Goblin King's (negative) attention already, she didn't want to encourage Hoggle to go whistling for his superior's guidance. 

And besides, irritated as she was at having her little spy session interrupted, she was a bit abashed at the expression on Hoggle's face, the raised and wiggling white eyebrows. _He really should be a dad--he's got the "I'm disappointed in you" look down cold..._

"Missy, I ain't knowing what you'd be about, but I knows I ain't liking it. I'd think better of you, girl," he huffed, and she flinched. Yup, he was disappointed in her. 

He continued to glare at her. "You gets to your room now, girlie, and waits for him there. Not right to snoop on family stuff," he muttered, shooting her a look from the corner of his eye. 

Never let it be said that Sarah left any fight, no matter how pointless, without trying. She rose stiffly and started, "But, Hoggle--" 

A stubby dwarf hand waved her off and a plump finger pointed to her room down the hallway. "Gets, girl. I'm not gonna hear it." 

"Fine, fine," she sighed and trotted down the hall, glancing regretfully back at the dwarf silhouetted in the sun. Her lips turned into a frown as she stared back-- 

_Wonder what his mom had been about to say? _

* * * 

Well, that was a fine little disaster, the dwarf thought, falling into a seated position with a grunt. Sarah at least didn't look too shaken--he wanted to think the Queen hadn't said anything incriminating yet, but he thought, grunting again to himself, he knew her too well for that. If Sarah hadn't heard anything to make her madder than a wet cat, it was only by luck, not the Queen's tact just now. 

He heard his lady's voice rising up to his ear and listened in, frowning. If he had to report this, after all, it wouldn't do to _not_ be able to say what precisely Sarah had _not_ heard. At least this way they'd have some idea of where her...knowledge was limited--that made sense to _him_, anyway, he reasoned. 

"So you do not deny it!" Her Ladyship was saying, emphatically, and Hoggle groaned to himself. Back to prodding the boy, was she? Well, it was to be expected, but still, a part of him feared for her, feared for her as if she were an innocent child poking a snoozing bull. 

The bull became a lion, roaring back at her. "I have never denied it! I have never denied I love her! And now, damn it all, because of _you_..." 

She cut in sharply. "It's because of me you've had this chance to begin with, son! And you were grateful for it! You've known all along, haven't you?" Her question hung in the air, taunting. "You simply did not want to trust yourself, because it wasn't _convenient_. Oh, I know, and I counted on that, Jareth. I counted on the fact you would overreact and then attempt to ignore the obvious--anything not to send her away from you again, am I right, my dear boy? And now you wish to be furious with me, because I brought her to you and now you must admit you accepted my gift all along..." 

"You overreach yourself, Mother. I have dealt with one parent's arrogance today; I do not feel like dealing with two." 

"Don't you _dare_ speak to me that way--" 

"Mother, _stop!"_ His voice was exhausted suddenly, raw and ripped like shredded velvet. "Yes, yes, of course I had reasoned it all out. Of course I hardly hurried her home. You know why. And it seemed to be working...but..." The High Prince's voice drifted off, wistful and suddenly rather young. _Like 'im's a boy again, asking for a cookie_, Hoggle thought. 

"But?" The Queen's voice seemed to prod both of them to return to their subject, as the High Prince began to murmur an answer. He was cut off, though, by another male voice. 

"How charming. A reunion," the voice said, and Hoggle stared at the floorboards in horror. He knew that voice too well, even though he'd avoided it for the majority of the years he'd served the Queen. 

The High King. 

* * * 

There was a silence. The sort of silence you heard before a marriage vow, before a storm's break, before a blade falling, before--well, in short, in those brief seconds it takes you to think up an eloquent reaction to a sudden turn in your life, said reaction usually expressed as _"Shit!" _

After the silence, the tap of boots crossing the floor, entering the room. The cool clink of glasses--_probably pouring himself a drink, _Hoggle thought, and then frowned. _Or maybe Jareth is. He'd be needing it, that's for sure_. 

"Well, aren't you going to enlighten me as to what our little problem is?" the High King drawled finally, coolly. 

"My problem, Father? My problem--" the High Prince snarled, but the dwarf heard the mother's voice below murmuring something in restraint. 

Another silence. Hoggle gnawed his considerable lip and pondered what to do. If he ran down there to interrupt, he might a.) let Sarah get out and get into mischief again, or b.) walk into the room below and promptly get himself killed by the crossfire of that lot. Being a wise, if compassionate sort, he reasoned long-distance sympathy was the best choice after all. 

It was the High King who broke the silence yet again. "Yes, problem, son. Obviously, there is one, or your mother would not be here right now. And, no, don't you tell me this is a coincidence, dearest. I've known you too long for that." 

"Don't tempt me to tell you just how little you know," she responded curtly. "But you are right: the problem is Sarah." There was a mild crashing noise and boot steps. "Jareth! Sit down again and be civil." 

The High Prince's voice shot back from a distance, as if he'd crossed the room. "Just how civil am I to be when you insist on rummaging about in my life as though it were your toy chest, Mother dearest?" There was the sound of glass hitting wood again--either filling a drink or finishing it, Hoggle couldn't tell--and his tone changed, becoming low, soft, and lethally tense. "I am growing very, very weary of this conversation." 

"Then let us finish this," the Queen said shortly. Hoggle rubbed his hands together nervously, praying. _One step wrong and he'll have her out of the castle for good, and then there'll be no living with either of them... _The volume of her voice increased, as if she'd swung her face in his direction. _"_He wishes to court that lovely mortal girl, if you must know, dearest _husband_, but the silly creature is distracted with thoughts of her home and so hasn't confessed how much she adores him." Yes, that was definitely a very bitter snort from the High Prince's corner. "Well, is that not the truth, darling?" 

The High King answered instead of his son. "Who knows what truth is there in a woman's mind? Oh, cease glaring at me, woman. I've been with enough of your lot to know you are all unfathomable. And, son, I should think you'd know better by now. Really, the answer is quite simple." 

"Simple. Really." The words fell from his lips carelessly, dripping with disdain. 

"Yes, quite. If she's distracted by her home, why not give it to her?" 

"Ahhh, yes, why didn't I think of that. If the bloody girl wants her home, why not send her there. Yes, I'm quite sure that's a novel idea," hissed the High Prince. 

"Really, Jareth, you ought to listen...." 

"Your mother is correct for once. Son, this girl is a mortal, no?" 

"An astute observation." 

"Bound to the mortal calendar, correct?" 

"Since I doubt she has any immortal version, I would assume so." 

"Then do you not see the day tomorrow?" 

"Oh, yes, just the opportunity!" the Queen squealed. Hoggle wiggled his eyebrows--things were bad if the High King and Queen actually agreed on something. "And to think, _you_ would be the romantic!" 

"Yes, well, there's a start for all of us, one would assume." 

"Would either of you mind clarifying this bloody idiocy for me?" Jareth ground out irritably. 

His father responded immediately: "Of course not. My boy, here's your chance--" 

The Queen's voice rose over his, smoothly interjecting, "And all women respond then--it's perfect, dear--here, we'll put in a spell, she'll be here just a day more and by then it will all be resolved, just you wait and see--" 

And then their voices slid together, in harmony--Hoggle briefly remembered just how much mischief those two could wreak when they stood on the same side-- 

"Tomorrow is Valentine's Day." 

* * * 


	18. Sweets for the Sweet

It is only recently that the English language has evolved sufficiently to describe Valentine's Day.

For the most part, it sucks.

Oh, yes, there are those blessed types who trade roses and bliss, but really, how many of them do you know? More often than not, we end up shoving overly priced candies (bad ones, too—lesson, gents: generic boxed chocolates are not as good as your standard Hershey's) at each other, stressing out absurdly about proving our love through fattening foods and hideously overpriced foliage. Then we wake up the next morning and wonder how it was that Valentine's was _not_ a ground-shaking Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan eternal love affair memory, rather like a figure skater lamenting the fact the best performance of her life didn't happen at the Olympics.

Ridiculous, really.

But could we help it? It all starts, as most of our problems do—ask any therapist—when we're just innocent kids. Innocent victims, rather, set up for the slaughter.

The massacre, that is. The St. Valentine's Day Massacre.

---------------

Fundamentally, there are two types of people in this world—and no, they aren't Democrats or Republicans. They are the Receivers, and the Cardless, and we can spot them from their earliest days in school. Remember those godawful card-trading sessions on Valentine's Day? Remember how you grew up and what was once a forced class practice, to give a card to everyone, became social dynamite, a charged climate in which you had to decide whom to card or not? And worse, what of the waiting for the card yourself?

And that's really where it all begins. We wait for our cards, looking around anxiously, trying to appear smooth and unruffled by the fact that first-grade trollop across the classroom has scored seven already and you've none. Or maybe one, from either the teacher or that one sickeningly sweet individual who inevitably went out and gave cards to her female buddies as well as the guys she liked. In either case, sexless (in as much as an elementary school child could have sexuality) and therefore not counting. All you knew in your gut is that you lacked value because you lacked a card. It was one step from there to an adolescence of _Allure _magazine, lip gloss, and desperately short skirts in a sad attempt to change the mind of the male world.

---------------

It was, appropriately enough, a gray and miserable morning, Sarah thought as she stared from her bed out at the Underground skies. Who would have thought it could rain in Fairyland?

As if rain were the only inconvenience to living here, she reminded herself with a snort. What with the nearly getting killed bit, and kidnapping kings, what was there again that made this world so attractive to her as a child—and, well, even as an adult? _You'd think by now I'd have gotten the little moral of the story, that it's better to be real than to live in fantasy…Yeah, right. As if reality had a chance after the Prince of Sexy showed up the damn first time._

She yawned and shoved herself off the bed. Sitting around would hardly solve her problems. "The chief issue, Williams," she muttered to herself as she entered the bathroom, "is that you know you should go home, but…" She bit her lip and winced at the face, still marked by sleep wrinkles, in the mirror before her. It was one thing to admit to yourself an attachment…not based on shared intellectual bases, one might say. It was another thing entirely to give voice to the idea that the Goblin King deserved his title as King of Dreams, and if she left herself alone with him for any sustained amount of time, she feared she'd willingly trade her freedom for a lifetime of being his slave. His sex slave, preferably—although that would probably last not too long. _Long enough in one sense, not long enough in another…Get a grip on yourself, Williams! _She tugged on her clothing, frowning. _Why do I keep going around and around on this? Fact: the man is a man-whore. Fact: he's got some perverse obsession with putting a notch marked "SW" on his headboard. _She hadn't seen any notches, but that didn't mean they didn't exist. _Fact: you like him because, well, you're human and straight, and it's been a while. This is not the stuff of forever. _

"Whatever." It was a pointless word, and entirely stupid to be talking aloud to herself, but at least it felt good to pretend she didn't care. Distantly, she heard the clatter of the goblins in the hall—no doubt Magda and Lippie, supervising the cleaning for the morning. Or maybe the Queen and Hoggle, a pair she definitely did not want to see. Hoggle's gaze, normally so affectionate and supportive, had all the warmth of Karen's when she caught her with her first beer at the age of 17. That memory did make her momentarily smile—_at least I won't be in rehab like some pathetic teen actress._ But the humor of the memory dissipated when she recalled that Hoggle's gaze, unlike her stepmother's, had not alterd over time. He continued to fix on her a look that might as well have been a flashing neon sign ("SARAH BAD! BAD SARAH!" perhaps, to appeal to Ludo's sense of grammar) for all of the subtley it displayed. She didn't even have the guts to single him out and demand he treat her like an adult, because she knew perfectly well what he'd say. He'd made it more than clear that he was not convinced of the sincerity of her objections to life in the Labyrinth, given the scenes he'd witnessed. Lately, too, he had a vaguely suspicious look in his eye when he watched her, a speculative look that boded poorly. Toby always had the same look in his eyes when he was trying to decide if he should hit her up for a loan for one of his video games; minutes after she'd see that thoughtful spark in his expression, he'd come to her, sighing forlornly over his tragic circumstances as a member of the oppressed adolescents of America, and eventually he'd reveal the shocking news that a new video game—always $49.99, of course—would lift him from his funk.

Hoggle didn't want her money, though. For all he liked her old plastic bangle bracelet before, she sincerely doubted a debit card would go far in the Goblin Kingdom. That is, if Hoggle even knew about them!

So Hoggle was definitely up to no good and best to be avoided. His near-constant sidekick lately was the Queen, and she was _absolutely_ to be avoided. She smiled at Sarah, an aggressively happy smirk, and Sarah's insides would freeze up; she suddenly knew how a captain of a vessel spotlit by a lighthouse felt. Even if she weren't related to Jareth, that smile—no, that damned _smirk_—signalled something was up. Something, Sarah was reasonably sure, she wouldn't like. _Well, maybe like too much, given what she wants of me…_But, really, was it too much to ask that the woman not look her as if she had "BROOD MARE FOR YOUR SON" hanging on a sign from her neck? It was enough to make one feel completely indecent; last night the Queen had actually ordered Hoggle to take a particular chair before Sarah sat down for dinner, just to force her to sit near Jareth. Who, of course, took every opportunity he could to make it clear he was interested in eating much more than the meal at hand. The things that man could do to a champagne class with his mouth…well, it just wasn't done. It was a testament to Jareth's skills that a maneuver that would like simply tacky coming from one of Sarah's peers, and more awful still to be performed at the same table as his parents, had Sarah lunging for her water, refusing to look at him the rest of the night, instead.

Her cheeks burning, Sarah impulsively grabbed the door to the wraparound balcony that connected several of the rooms on this die of the castle. If she waited a bit, maybe whoever was in the hallway would pass and she wouldn't have to talk to whoever it was. Or explain, of course, why she was now red as the proverbial tomato.

The weather at least was obliging her, if all else did not: it was bright, crisp, and clear. As Sarah lifted her face to the winter sun, she caught a flash from the corner of her eye.

_Oh, shit. _

It seemed only the weather was obliging her today.

At least it wasn't Jareth. _Or his father_, Sarah reminded herself with an inward shudder. It wasn't even the Queen, or Hoggle.

It was Elana.

She stood farther down the balcony—far enough that you'd have to raise your voice to call to her, close enough that an exclamation, not a shout, would be necessary. And she didn't appear to have noticed Sarah yet—she had her hands on the ledge, looking quietly off into the distance with an absorbed expression on her face, her lips turned slightly downwards. It did not escape Sarah's bitter inner critic that Elana, like all the other immortals, even managed to be cinematically beautiful in a moment where she thought herself alone—perfectly still, a wind lightly ruffling long, waving curls in a caress, as her eyes reflected the emptiness of the winter sun beyond.

She had half an inclination to turn and leave—back to her room, if not a walk in the opposite direction on the balcony, just to get away. But Sarah was always one to open Pandora's box, and she knocked that inclination to the side.

"Um, hi?"

---------------

He grunted and adjusted the sack of mud on his back. Her Majesty, she liked to soak her skin in that muck, no matter how silly it seemed to the rest of the goblin lot. Sarah, she hadn't thought it was that silly, he remembered; she'd shown him a picture in one of her magazines, and explained Aboveground ladies, they did the same thing. It was all foolishness, if you asked him, but Hoggle was old enough and wise enough not to stand between a woman and her skin care, no matter what he privately thought of it.

Not to think about it—that was his motto for the moment about the Goblin King and his whole damned family. Of course, Hoggle admitted to himself, he'd keep that vow for all of a minute, just like any other resolution. But he had to try, or the lot of them would drive him damned mad.

He kept hiking back towards the castle. There was a mild uproar in the castle now—there was a party tonight, after all, and given the Queen's temperment lately, a _big_ party. All she thought about was His Majesty, anyway. That is, Jareth. Not that she didn't think of her do-nothing former husband, the old king, but only to tell Hoggle regularly that the man was a louse who had made it difficult for their son to state his mind, or some such phrase. Personally, Hoggle didn't think Jareth had any difficulty whatsoever stating his mind, but that was the Queen for you. At least she was feeling good, though—part of Hoggle wished she'd accept defeat, while another part of him inevitably wanted her to have her way. She was like a little child, in a way—not so very different from the King himself in that way. Or Sarah—she was just a little girl herself, for all she thought she was a great lady grown.

"Damnation!" He made the mistake of glancing upwards just as the trees parted; the sun, flashing like a new-cut diamond, blinded him. He squeezed his eyes shut to drive away the resultant dancing dots in his vision, then looked forward again—and stopped cold.

Oh, no, Her Majesty would not be liking this _at all_. There was Miss Sarah, all but haloed by trouble, as usual, and there was the Lady Elana, the King's gal. He whistled softly to himself, and debated dropping the mud and running, to get a message to the queen. Remembering the last time she'd gone without her mud mask, though, he adjusted the bag on her should and kept walking on, a steady eye all the while on the castle. The Queen might be happy for her mud, but he doubted she'd be happy for this dirt…

---------------

Elana looked over at Sarah. The sky, naturally, sent obnoxious beams of light down to point out the miraculous high and lowlights in her hair.

Sarah fought back the urge to instant hatred. _Breathe, Williams, breathe…She's not to blame for Clairol's cruel promises…_

The woman must have sensed Sarah's emotional turbulence, because she simply inclined her head slowly. "I did not mean to disturb you, Sarah. I am sorry if I did." Her voice was actually…_sweet_. And not in a revoltingly 1940s _Snow-White_ way, but just a pleasant and kindly female tone—pleasant enough that Sarah felt a traitorous desire to befriend the girl arise within her, the instinctive sense of _sameness _felt between women stuck by fate in a shared hell, like a baby shower.

"No, no, I wasn't disturbed, I just saw you there, that's all—feel free to stay," she found herself blurting out. She tried to lean against the low wall with the same elegance as Elana and tried not to visualize the crumpled mess she was making of herself. Elana, at least, seemed not to acknowledge the possibility that they weren't making a gorgeous image the moment—head tilted, she was observing Sarah with a slightly unfocused expression, as if she didn't quite see her. Sarah had been to enough bars to know that look: it meant either intoxication (unlikely, she judged) or a person who wanted to spill something—and not a drink.

Curiosity, that feline serial-killer, never lost its attraction for Sarah. Granted, her brain hurt from thinking too much about Jareth and her own life lately, but what cause did this nymphette, involved with Jareth's father, have to wear the expression frequently seen before all-night martini marathons? It wasn't like she was in jail with Paris Hilton, after all.

"You seem a bit down, if you don't mind me saying so—is everything okay?"

Fortunately for Sarah, Elana was not like many a roommate who would use such a question as an invitation to burst into tears. "I am fine, thank you…I am only wondering…"

"Yes?"

"About directions…" Elana sighed (musically; Sarah was too caught up in impending gossip to grind her teeth) and turned back to the view, away from Sarah. Just as the quiet dragged out and it seemed she'd say no more, she flashed a sharp and sudden look back at Sarah. "Is it wrong to seek a goal?" Sarah's inarticulate grunt of surprise did not appease Elana, apparently, for she continued. "There is something…I want. Very much. But it does not seem to be. And will not be. Is it wrong to seek it?"

Feeling very much as if she'd been shoved into a live game of tennis, Sarah dove for social safety. "I'm not sure what you mean—what is it you want?"

The blond girl glanced agitatedly away. "Happiness, of course. Who does not want it? I had him, but—"

"Him? Happiness is a _him_?" Gloria Steinem would be proud; Sarah exclaimed the question automatically.

"Of course. Is it not always so?" Sarah bit her lip rather than answer that one. The Fae woman went on. "We are together, but he is—" She frowned, her hands gesturing for words that didn't come quickly enough. "He—We come here, I do not see him. We do not talk. And even now, I do not know where he is."

"You mean Jareth's dad?"

"Yes, of course, the King." She looked down dejectedly. "I know not what to speak. I know he is very busy; I know of His Highness, the Prince, and of _her_," the venom in her voice let no doubt about the identity of that female; in any language, that inflection designated the rival, "but he does not come to tell me of these things. It was not this way before." Her eyes flickered up and over to Sarah. "Before we came here, you know. Then, he could not be without me. Then, he wanted to speak to me."

"So you're just upset that you haven't seen the King?" Sarah frowned. A part of her was compassionate to the cry of (yet another) woman wronged; a part of her didn't understand, however, what the issue was with being alone for a day, or two.

Elana shook her head. A flicker of a tear slid, diamond-like, down her cheek. "The Prince loves you, they say."

"Let's not get too carried away--"

Elana jerked her head aggressively. "Say what you will, but it is well known he wants to marry _you_. But his father…" Her voice trailed off, and with it, her spirit seemed to go as well.

Sarah looked away and bit her lip. Wasn't the King married? Wasn't that what Jareth had said—he'd remarried _and_ this Elana was a bit on the side? What did you do in such a case? If it were a girlfriend at home, she'd break it to the girl that her man was a cheating ass and about as likely to marry her (and stay married to her) as to the last woman he'd screwed over. But Elana _had _to know Nicholas had a wife; it would be like Brad Pitt trying to deny he'd been married to Jennifer Aniston when he met Angelina Jolie. Their lives were just too public for lying to be a possibility.

"Have you, um, talked to him about it?" It was the only diplomatic question she felt she could ask, other than "What on earth do you see in him?"

Elana sighed again. "Of course. But he—" she waved a hand brusquely. "He pretends not to hear. And then he sees me not. He wants to know of his son, this place, these people….but not me. He used to come for me every other day, you know, and want to dine with me on mornings when his dear friends were not in town. I could rely upon it." She said the last part with a thrust of weak pride, as if being second-best was somehow a prize. _I guess it is—in a way, you're still "chosen." _

"Why do you want to be with him?" She couldn't help herself. Call it far too many hours logged watching _The Tyra Banks Show_, but she hated letting doormats be doormats.

Elana looked surprised. "Who does not want her….how do you say it. Oh, yes. Happily ever after?"

The winter air was cold but Sarah's blood ran hot. "Do you think he has to be it? Why not making yourself happy?"

Elana clearly was not caught up in the sisterhood spirit. "But he would not be?" she responded hesitantly, brow furrowed in confusion.

"Look, Elana, I'm not trying to tell you how to live your life," Sarah began, ignoring the little voice that immediately howled, _Oh, yes, you are_, "but really. C'mon. It's your life, not his, not anybody else's. Do what _you_ want to do, what makes _you_ happy. And if he doesn't do that for you, why stick around?"

Elana's furrowed expression shifted to speculative. "Is this your way?"

Okay, touché. Elana's glance from the corner of her eyes told Sarah she knew perfectly well she'd landed her mark, too. She swallowed her tart response and went for bravado instead. "Of course!"

Elana nodded slowly, her face still a lovely blank page. "I see…Then let us make a promise, together…" Her words rushed out in a gasp of air as she grabbed Sarah's hands.

"Which is? I have to be careful about my words around here—"

"To seek our happiness, and to help one another find it…"

"Um, okay?"

"And I shall help you by delivering this letter from the Prince, and you shall accept his invitation…"

Sarah glanced down at the bit of paper in her hand, complete with an elegant heart traced lightly on it.

For the second time today—but this time out loud, Sarah's profane side took over. "Oh, shit!"

---------------

Somewhere deep in the castle, a woman met with a dwarf.

"We're not Cupid, my dear, but we'll do."

He studiously avoided looking at her green-slathered face. On him, a bit of green was normal. Not on the likes of the Missus.

"I'm not hearing you, darling!" The voice had a touch of whip in it; at moments like these, you just knew Jareth didn't take all after his old man.

"Yes, I'm supposin' so…"

"And don't worry about _her_. She's no problem."

He muttered agreement sullenly. He didn't like this at all and he didn't know why she didn't care about this turn of things—seems the last person she'd want around Sarah would be Nicholas' little lady, all but bound to tell tales!

"You just rely on me, dear. Who knows better than a mother?" The phrasing was sharp, sharp enough to suggest what would become of one who presumed to know better.

As anxiety ripped down his back, Hoggle swallowed, and realized—there was a reason he never failed to send cards to his dear mum back in the forest, all right. Some forces were not to be trifled with.

---------------


End file.
